Marist religious are committed to the Society of Mary by their vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. The serious commitment of the vows helps Marists to live as disciples of Jesus, and give concrete witness to a new world initiated by the risen Jesus.

Marist, who strive to follow the example of Mary, have an added incentive to pray, for Mary was a woman of prayer. She pondered on life’s events in her heart and, as a member of the first Christian community joined with the apostles in prayer.

The founder, Fr Jean-Claude Colin, encouraged Marists to be “men of prayer”, learning in prayer to “taste God”.

Celebration of the Eucharist, praying the Prayer of the Church in common, daily mediation, regular spiritual reading, examination of conscience, an annual retreat, are all part of the spiritual rhythm of Marist life.

YEAR OF ST JOSEPH

As a follow up to the March Reflection from the Superior General and to respond to the call of Pope Francis to celebrate in 2021 a year of St Joseph a small booklet has been produced by the GA containing some common and Marist prayers.  You can dowload this booklet here.

New Zealand confrere, Chris Skinner sm, has composed a hymn for the Year of Saint Joseph: Guardian Protector.

NOVENA FOR VOCATIONS

It is a tradition in the Society of Mary to pray a Novena for Vocations before the Feast of Saint Peter Chanel on 28 April.

Here you can find examples of prayers prepared by the provinces:

English

French

Spanish

Italian

Portuguese

Community life is important for Marists. Their founder wanted them to start renewing the Church in and through their own communities. Their only model should be the community of first believers of Jerusalem.

The vocation is part of the mystery of the person, particularly in his relationship with God and his mission in life. We speak about a vocation when in a loving dialogue God invites us to occupy a special place in the building of God’s Kingdom.

There are a variety of ways to discover your vocation. In general, discerning a vocation involves prayer and reflection on how God has spoken to you through your experiences and the people in your life.

If you want to know more about (Marist) vocations, please make contact with a member of the Society of Mary or  visit our vocations website  www.maristyouthinternational.org

“Think as Mary, judge as Mary, feel and act as Mary in all things”.
In order to be effective evangelisers, Marists take Mary as their model in their way of living. They gradually think, judge, feel and act in a new way – the way of Mary. It is an approach to life.

“Hidden and Unknown in the world”
This phrase has to do with the manner in which Marists live their lives in order to bring the women and men of their time to Christ. Mary was present in the early Christian community at Jerusalem, but her presence was a quiet, unassuming one. Marists try to have the same presence. To pattern oneself on Mary in this way is not to hide away but to be engaged fully in life but in a simple, gentle, humble way.

“Instruments of Divine Mercy”
The love of God for us in Christ is at the very centre of the Christian message. When Marists are asked to become “instruments of divine mercy” they are being asked to portray this feature of God and they are to help build a Church which is perceived, not in terms of power, planning, control, administration and competitiveness, but rather in terms of community, compassion, simplicity, mercy and fellowship. For this reason, Marists are to embrace and be welcoming to all, to the exclusion of no one, and to have an open heart to all.

Fr Jean-Claude Colin, the founder of the Society of Mary, was strongly convinced that the Society was called “to do great things” and to work “in any corner of the world”.

When, in 1836, the Society of Mary received from the Holy See the responsibility of evangelising Oceania, Jean-Claude Colin, freshly elected Superior General, started sending missionaries. Between 1836 and 1849, 15 groups left France to go to the missions in Oceania: New Caledonia, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Fiji Islands, Wallis and Futuna, Tonga, Vanuatu, Samoa and New Zealand.

The mission was undertaken with great spiritual conviction and human courage.  Many of the Marist Missionaries recorded what they observed, they kept their logbooks, recording how they were received, detailing the difficulties they met and the works they undertook. Their vast collection of letters and logbooks are conserved in the Society’s General Archives in Rome. They have been and still are an important source for historians and anthropologists studying the cultures of the Islands in the South Pacific.

In 2009 the Society published “Lettres reçues d’Océanie”: a critical edition with annotations – 10 volumes – containing 1365 letters written by the Marist missionaries to the General Administration of the Society of Mary between 1836 and 1854.

“The Marist Places of Origin” refer to places in France which are significant in the story of the founding of the Society of Mary by a group of French Marists and its founder, Fr Jean-Claude Colin.

More: https://www.maristplaces.org/

Marcellin Champagnat was born at Marlhes, in France in 1789 during the turbulent time of the French Revolution. His father held an important position in local politics and he introduced Marcellin to many practical skills.

In 1803 he was asked if he would like to be a priest. He gave the matter deep consideration and committed himself to the task with outstanding dedication. Despite his own lack of sound, formal education, he worked hard at his studies. He always valued the role of education and it is not surprising that providing a good education for children and the young became a very important passion during his life.

In the seminary of St Irenaeus in Lyon, France, Marcellin met many who were inspired with an idea of founding a religious congregation dedicated to the work of Mary. During the academic year of 1815 – 1816 the “Marist aspirants” discussed their hopes and made their plans for the founding of the Society of Mary. They envisaged a congregation of three branches: priests, sisters, and a third order of lay people, all of whom would undertake the ‘work of Mary.’ At the suggestion and insistence of Marcellin (“We need brothers!”), a branch of teaching brothers was added.

Following his ordination in 1816, Marcellin was appointed to the parish of La Valla, where he began immediately the work of founding the “Little Brothers of Mary”. With outstanding commitment and great personal charisma, he gathered a community around him and attended to the urgent need of providing Christian education to many of the young people of his region. Soon many others were attracted to his work and schools flourished at first throughout France and later, to places all over the world.

Marcellin also shared responsibility for the foundation of the priests’ branch of the congregation. He worked tirelessly in the area of Lyon to promote the beginnings of the Society of Mary and, following formal ecclesiastical approval in 1836, took his vows along with the first Marists.

Marcellin died on 6th June, 1840 at the age of 51 years.  On the 18th April, 1999 Pope John Paul II proclaimed Marcellin Joseph Benoit Champagnat, S.M. a saint of the Church of God.  His feast day is celebrated on the 6th June.

In 2010 the Society of Mary introduced the cause for beatification of nine Spanish Marist confreres who were martyred during the 1936 religious’ persecution in Spain. The diocese of Alcalà de Henares has decided to present one group of 43 diocesan priests, religious and lay people, killed and buried in the common grave in Paracuellos del Jarama, including some of our confreres: Frs Antonio de Santiago, Fausto Muñoz, Romualdo Sáenz, Timoteo Uriondo and Zacarías Feijóo.

In 2016 in New Zealand the cause of beatification of Marist Father Antoine Marie Garin was launched.

After making his profession as a member of the Society of Mary, in 1840 Garin was assigned to New Zealand, where he arrived with 10 other members of the society on the Mary Grey at the Bay of Islands on 14 June 1841. He was provincial of the Marists in New Zealand from 1841 to 1843 and, despite Pompallier’s growing antagonism to the society, he was nominated several times to Rome as a possible bishop.

In 1850 he was assigned to Nelson where he remained for the next 40 years. He had the pastoral care of 200 – 300 Catholics scattered over the huge area of Nelson, Buller, Marlborough and the northern part of the region that became Westland. He journeyed constantly to visit his people, on both foot and horseback, often inflicting great privations on his not over robust constitution. He was responsible for education early in Nelson’s history and opened orphanages for both boys and girls as early as 1872. In 1876 he gave lectures to the citizens of Nelson for a fee to raise funds to purchase land for a boy’s orphanage. The sum collected was thirteen pounds.

Garin died on the 14th April 1889.

When Garin was exhumed 18 months after his death, to be reinterred in the crypt below this chapel his body was found to be incorrupt despite the coffin found filled with water which was the quickest way for a body to decompose.

https://teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/1g4/garin-antoine-marie

The Marist Sisters branch of the Marist project was due to the insight and zeal of Jeanne Marie Chavoin, from the town of Coutouvre in the South-East of France. With two others she began the first community of Marist Sisters in September 1823.
“Our congregation is characterised by the desire to make the mystery of Mary in the church the daily inspiration of its life and action, and not by any special work nor by the promotion of any particular form of Marian devotion….” (Marist Sisters Constitutions)

The Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary were founded by Francoise Perroton a French lay woman who traveled to the island of Wallis in Oceania not long after the first Marist Fathers arrived there. She lived as a member of the Third Order of Mary and ministered especially to the women and children of the island. In 1931 the Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary were approved as a religious congregation.
“We wish to respond to the calls of today with the daring and zeal of the pioneers. We want to keep alive this daring – simple, joyful and prudent – based solely on the love and power of God in order to announce the Gospel in its force and integrity, learning to adapt ourselves to different cultures and conditions of life. “ (Missionary Sisters Constitutions)

The original vision for the Marist project saw ‘the whole world Marist’, through the lives of countless lay people taking on the spirit of Mary and sending ripples of Gospel vigour throughout the secular world. Lay involvement in the Marist Family first took the shape of a Third Order of the Society of Mary under Saint Julian Eymard. It has since developed into a wide variety of Marist Lay groups, formal and informal in different parts of the world.

The Society of Mary is present in all continents.

Local units are:

• Africa
• Asia
• Australia
• Canada
• Europe
• Mexico
• New Zealand
• Oceania
• South America
• United States of America

The Society of Mary, now and always, is missioned to bring the Good News and signs of God’s Kingdom into a broken world. We are especially tasked to serve the young, the vulnerable and those neglected by society. In light of this calling, we are committed to promote a safeguarding culture in our houses, ministries; wherever we work and live.

Each unit of the Society has appropriate protocols to promote a safeguarding environment, methodology for responding to complaints of abuse, and a system of ongoing education in safeguarding for its membership. The units are expected to review and revise these protocols on a regular basis. And most importantly the protocols are to be adhered to faithfully and without exception.

Safeguarding issues in the Society are handled by the responsible authorities in the local Unit, namely the Province or District.