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The beginnings of the Society of Mary Background to the Society, it's beginnings, approbation, first steps, early works and the Society of Mary, yesterday, today and tomorrow. At first signt an element that does not fit in so nicely. It seems out of place, a postscript. The first generation of Marists were not too clear on what to do with it. It was an image more than an idea: a tree, sometimes with many branches sometimes with three, sometimes with four. What is the prophetic vision? Claudine of Lyon: the French Connection When Mayet speaks of the hill overlooking the Saone near Serin, he is not giving me information he picked up a few minutes earlier in a Baedeker guide book. He is talking about the place where he was born and grew up, and where Claudine lived from the age of twenty (1794) until she moved across the Saone to Fourviere in 1820. - Gaston Lessard. Colin's original vision and it implications A new, little Society is starting. It has two ends: personal perfection and the salvation of the neighbors. It will attain these ends by placing itself under the name and the protection of Mary, and it will be dedicated to preaching missions at home and abroad, education of youth, and various other ministries. And it will comprise these three religious congregations: Fathers, Brothers, Sisters, and also a Confraternity for lay people. - Jean Coste Common Marist spiritual realities Jean Coste's attempt to explore our Marist 'memory', to rediscover what has been deposited there in the course of our life in the Society with to hope that it is possible to relate these various elements better to one another. - Jean Coste First election of superior general September 24, 1836: the Society of Mary “drawn up as in battle array". - Gaston Lessard. Government in the Society of Mary We are trying to explore Colin’s original vision and its implication for our life today. Now we’ll see the implication of Colin’ s vision at the level of structure. - Jean Coste On Christmas Eve, 1836, an hour before noon, after two months of waiting, the right combination of wind and tide finally enabled La Josephine and La Delphine to leave Le Havre. Their departure opened the way for all those that followed. - Gaston Lessard. Jean-Claude Colin and the Marist tradition among the Fathers Two words characterize our responsibility in this regard concerning the intentions and the spirit of the founders: agnoscantur and serventur : 'we should get to know them' and 'preserve the vitality'. Making the vision of Fr Colin work for us When Father Colin resigned as superior general of the Marist Fathers in 1854, one of his main concerns was to give himself, at long last, the leisure he needed to finish writing the rule for Marists. This rule had now been in the making for more than thirty-five years. - Gaston Lessard. Marist history and Marist spirituality "Marist history" is what our Marist ancestors actually said and did and thought. "History" can also refer to our knowledge of the past, our account of it, the story we tell about the past. And that story, what is it? What can it be? What should it be? An account of things as they actually were? Or something else? Or something more? We won't know what was said during the exchange between Colin and Favre, but we know enough to say that the disagreement between Colin and Favre which surfaced on this and on several other occasions, was both deep and difficult to isolate because it reflected two basically divergent views of the Society of Mary. - Gaston Lessard. Marist spirituality in four voices An examination of how each of the four Marist congregations can contribute, in its own way, to fulfilling the Marist mission in today's church. What each congregation has become: that is what is proper to us, what distinguishes us, what enables the Marist concert in the church to have the richness of a variety of instruments, of several voices. - Gaston Lessard. Mary's initiative at the origins of the Society of Mary Showing the extent, the constant awareness of, and the energising power of Jean-Claude Colin's deep consciousness that the reality of the Society and of its vocation and mission did not stem from his initiative or the initiative of the original Marist group. It belonged to Mary. What is the Society of Mary about? What are its goals? How does it plan to fulfil them? - Gaston Lessard. Points of continuity between our founders and us "What are we today? What have our founders been yesterday?" and to try to see whether there is, between the two realities, a real and living continuity. September 24, 1936: the Society of Mary "drawn up as in battle array". The brief of April 29 empowered, in a precise and limited way, the priest members of the Society of Mary to elect a superior general and to take simple vows. The meeting where this took place was held in Belley, four months after the brief of approval arrived there. - Gaston Lessard. The four founders and what animated them An introduction to the four founders of the Marist Family what animated all four of them and how the actual groups each followed their own way. - Gaston Lessard. The Marist Project and Assessment Using the view of the Marist project can provide direction and focus in the assessment process and the examination of candidates applying to join the enterprise. - Gaston Lessard. The name and purpose of Mary's society It was Fr Colin's purpose to bring the reader to a generous acceptance of the service of Mary and not to define the exact place of marian devotion in the spirituality of Marists.
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