Formar almas, plasmar corações, dirigir vontades: o projeto educacional das Filhas da Caridade da Sociedade São Vicente de Paulo (1898-1905)

Abstract

By means of this research we intended to analyze the possible conditions to the creation of the Colégio Nossa Senhora das Dores in the city of São João del-Rei, MG. Created in 1898 by the Daughters of Charity, it began its activity with a school aimed only and exclusively at the feminine group. The building was built to house one hundred boarding students and others externals to the primary formation, junior high, secondary and the teachers? course, which functioned in a boarding, semi and external regime. By looking at the different extracts of the formation to which the school turned to, I emphasized the study of the teachers? formation, trying to understand the relations between society and religious education and its articulation with the educational models spread at the time. Because of that I analyzed the disciplinary devices destined to institutionalize a program, which had as principle the diffusion of the Christian doctrine associated with the teaching formation practiced at the school in the beginning of its operation. Because of the interrelationship between the school and urban environments built at the end of the XIX century and the beginning of the XX century, the city reshuffle made emerge in SJDR, an exemplar building represented by the mineiro eclecticism configuration. In this research, the school times and knowledge became fundamental to proceed the analysis of the creation and operation of the institution examined. The study focused the period between the creation of the institution (1898) until 1905, year in which the teachers? course of CNSD was treated as the courses of the official teachers? school of the State. This research, based in the analysis of the law, journals and reports of the presidents of the Province/ State, regulations and the Congregation?s status and a wide documentation located at CNSD, crossed these documentations, and intended to problematize the Government dimensions inside the plans of the Catholic Church, in general terms and of the Congregation of the São Vicente de Paulo mission and specifically, of the daughters of Charity. It's possible to say that the CNSD, through the Daughters of Charity of the SVP left marks in São João del-Rei as a Christian Brazilian catholic school, which reaffirm the wide tradition to make the school an instrument of faith affirmation. For that, contributed the new legal status acquired in 1905, enlarging the legitimacy earned by CNSD, constituted as a signal of forces of the Sisters in the city, as well as the efficiency strategies and effectiveness of the educational action which had the Vicentinas in São João del-Rei as protagonists. In this perspective it's possible to affirm that the expansionist Roman Catholic project intended to extend its radius of action to many locations, either inside the mineira city, either in Brazil and other countries. For that, a rigorous system of rules was elaborated by the Congregation, constituted, in its majority by men, having in mind the affirmation and the establishment of the project of the Daughters of Charity in different places.