Carol Ramey, Thursday, March 10, 2:30 PM on Mary and the Chaminade Year

Blessed William Joseph Chaminade, Founder of the Marianist Family (by Brother John M. Samaha, S.M.)

This is the biographical notice about William Joseph Chaminade included in the booklet for the beatification ceremony at which Pope John Paul II presided at Vatican City on September 3, 2000.

William Joseph Chaminade was born in Perigueux, France, in 1761.  He was the fourteenth child of a profoundly Christian family. Besides William Joseph, three of his brothers were priests.  In 1771 he entered the minor seminary of Mussidan, where, four years later, he made private vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.  He was ordained a priest in 1785.

In 1790, after the French Revolution had begun, he moved to Bordeaux where he spent most of his life.  In 1791 he refused to take the oath of the so-called Civil Constitution of the Clergy, and clandestinely exercised priestly ministry, putting his life in continual danger.  During this period he came to know Venerable Marie-Therese Charlotte de Lamourous (1754-1836), who was one of his closest collaborators and whom he later helped to found the work of the Misericorde in Bordeaux for the protection of young women.  In 1795, he was given the delicate task of receiving back into the diocese priests who, having taken the constitutional oath, wanted to make their peace with the Church.  He exercised this ministry for two years, facilitating the reconciliation of some fifty priests.

In 1797, during the Reign of the Directorate, he was forced to immigrate to Zaragoza, Spain, where he resided for three years.  There, close to the Shrine of Our Lady of the Pillar, he forged his Marian apostolic convictions and was inspired to found a family of lay and religious members dedicated to Mary.  In November of 1800, he returned to Bordeaux and re-founded the old Marian Sodality on a new basis.  He made every effort to give his sodalists solid religious formation and directed them toward precise apostolic objectives, encouraging them to offer to an indifferent and de-Christianized society "the spectacle of a people of saints," as did the Christians of the primitive Church.  This Sodality would be the base of his untiring evangelizing activity, aimed at the re-Christianization of France.  Chaminade has rightly been considered the precursor of the active participation of the laity in the life of the Church in modern times.

During these years he was named Apostolic Administrator in order to reorganize the Diocese of Bazas.  In 1801 he received from the Holy See the title of Missionary Apostolic.  This title was the official confirmation of his intentions concerning the Church in this new era.

Father Chaminade viewed his own ministry and that of the Marian Sodalities as a permanent and stable mission, directed toward formation in the faith, using new methods and working in close alliance with Mary.  The Sodality of Bordeaux spread to other cities of the region and to the whole of France through groups that asked for affiliation because they desired to follow the inspiration and methods of Father Chaminade.  During these years Chaminade fostered some groups of young men and women who, desiring greater dedication, made private vows and dedicated themselves to the apostolate of the Sodality, without leaving their secular work.

In 1816, together with Venerable Adele de Batz de Trenqueleon (1789-1828), he founded at Agen the Institute of the Daughters of Mary Immaculate, and the following year at Bordeaux, the Society of Mary.  His first members, who, with time, would be called Marianists, were members of the Marian Sodality, women and men who wished to respond to the Lord with a more radical commitment, an extension of their baptismal consecration and of their devotion to the Virgin Mary.  They were to be "the person who never dies," ensuring that the sodalities would continue and bear witness to the Gospel in all its consequences.

The two religious institutes developed rapidly in France, and in 1839 received the decree of praise from Pope Gregory XVI.  Since teaching was a primary need at that time, both Marianist Institutes dedicated themselves to elementary and secondary schools and to trade schools, first in the southwest of France and then in Franche-Comte and Alsace.  They taught in order to educate and to form in the faith.  Chaminade also formed an ambitious project to establish a network of normal schools for the formation of Christian teachers.  Some of these schools were founded by men and women religious, but the revolution of 1830 made their continuation impossible.

During these years Father Chaminade gave priority to drafting the Constitution's rule of life), and he wrote important circular letters about consecration, alliance with Mary, and Marianist religious life.  The communities and works of the Society of Mary continued to grow in France, and then in Switzerland (1839) and the United States of America (1849).  After 1836 the Daughters of Mary Immaculate implemented the will of their Foundress, who had died in 1828, and created a number of rural schools in the southwest of France for the education of girls and the promotion of the condition of women.

The last ten years of his life were for William Joseph Chaminade a period of severe trial–-problems of health, financial difficulties, the departure of some disciples, misunderstandings and mistrust on the part of others, obstacles to the exercise of his mission as Founder.  Chaminade faced these difficulties with great confidence in Mary, faithful to his conscience and to the Church, filled with faith and charity.  He died in peace, surrounded by many of his religious sons, next to the Chapel of the Madeleine in Bordeaux, on January 22, 1850.

A comment of his written in 1825 to a group of young sodalists, sums up his life: "By the great mercy of God toward me and toward others, for a long time I have lived and breathed only to spread devotion to the august Virgin and thus to contribute each day to the growth and multiplication of her Family."  This Marianist Family remains vital today in his two religious institutes, in associations of consecrated life in the world, in various lay communities, and in other groups or movements inspired by the doctrine and insights of their blessed founder.

May the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit be glorified in all places through the Immaculate Virgin Mary.

Return to Top

Song of Songs: In Memory of Henry Setter

The Marian Library Gallery is featuring the work of Henry Setter '51, a prolific illustrator, sculptor and art educator who died in 2009.  The exhibit runs through Friday, April 15, on the seventh floor of Roesch Library.  Hours are 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and Saturday and Sunday by appointment.  Call 229-4214.  Click here for virtual exhibit.

Return to Top