Bishop Baraga: the Snowshoe Priest

Gripping a seven-foot cross in one hand, and a pair of 26-foot-long snowshoes in the other, the four-ton copper statue of Bishop Baraga looked a little incongruous standing in a park on the sunny September day we last visited him.

Standing tall atop a small steel pouf of cloud supported by five wooden arches, the statue adopts what may seem to be a modestly devout posture with its bowed head when viewed from a distance. A closer look, though, reveals some of the steely resolve that probably sustained the priest as he traveled the frozen Upper Peninsula in the coldest part of winter.

Father Baraga, born in 1797 in Slovenia, originally studied law and graduated from law school in 1821. He opted to enter the priesthood, however, and began his missionary work in America after arriving in the western Great Lakes region in 1830.

Baraga worked primarily among Native Americans with the intent of spreading the Catholic faith, establishing five missions in the region—represented by the five arches supporting the statue.

Father Baraga established the last of those missions at the village of L’Anse, and the site of an earlier Jesuit mission during the 1600s.

The priest became the first bishop of the Upper Peninsula in 1853.

Bishop Baraga reportedly enjoyed a life of upper-class comfort in Europe, which makes later stories of long treks through the snowy UP to complete his circuit of far-flung churches to minister to native peoples and small communities of copper miners even more amazing. He continued his long snowshoe treks into his sixties, writing about traveling over 700 miles through some snowy winters.

Bishop Baraga gained a reputation as a kind and compassionate man who loved the native people and supported their desire to retain their culture and tried to help protect them from relocation efforts.

Bishop Baraga learned the native languages and the prolific author developed a written language for them so he could write grammar, dictionaries and prayer books for native readers. As a child, he studied in a variety of languages that included French, German, Latin and Greek—none of those languages his native Slovenian, which may explain his multilingual fluency.

His health deteriorated over the last decade of his life as he went deaf and suffered several strokes. One source says the statue’s stern expression is due to the fact that the Bishop had already suffered a stroke and couldn’t smile by the time of the statue’s creation.

Bishop Baraga died at Marquette, Michigan in 1868.

Bishop Baraga namesakes in the Upper Peninsula include a village, county and a state park.

The Bishop Baraga Association raised money to build the Shrine in the 1960s on donated land and continues to collect donations to help operate and maintain the shrine, which attracts an average of 100,000 visitors each year.

The outdoor shrine, on US-41 and a mile west of the turn to downtown L’Anse, is always open to visitors.

Check the Web for hours at the small shop on site selling religious books, gift and snacks—reopened since our last visit.

Benches around the park and a view of Keweenaw Bay from a high bluff make it a great place to spend a little quiet time.

The two-acre park setting of the Shrine of the Snowshoe Priest was deserted and peaceful during our visit, leaving us free to walk around the statue and snap some great photos against the clear, blue sky.

© Dominique King 2009

Comments

[JimmyK64]

Thanks for this insightful report. I love reading about people of great character and strong will. Neat to see that more than 100 years after Bishop Baraga's death, his memory continues to loom large in his adopted communities.

[Dominique]

Jimmy-I found Bishop Baraga's story pretty fascinating. "Great character and strong will" certainly seems to describe this man!