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A servant of God
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Mother Mary of the Passion, who was beatified on October 20, followed St. Francis of Assissi's evangelical spirit of simplicity, poverty and chastity. She was the founder of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary in India.
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Mary of the Passion
THE founder of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary, Mary of the Passion (Helene Marie Philippine de Chappotin de Neuville) was born on May 21, 1839 in Nantes, France. She was the youngest of the five children born to Charles de Chappotin and Sophie Galbaud du Fort. From childhood, she showed eminent natural gifts and a deep faith. In December 1860, with the consent of the Bishop of Nantes, she entered the Poor Clares whose ideal, based on St. Francis' simplicity and poverty, attracted her.
On January 23, 1861, while still a postulant, she had a profound experience of God. This experience marked her entire life. A short time after, having become seriously ill, she had to leave the convent. When she was well again, her confessor directed her to the Society of Mary Reparatrix whose members were dedicated to Eucharistic adoration in union with Mary at the foot of the Cross, making reparation for the sins of the world. She was accepted into the order on August 15, 1864. In Toulouse, she received the religious habit and the name "Mary of the Passion".
In March 1865, while still a novice, she was sent to India, to the Apostolic Vicariate of Madurai, entrusted to the Society of Jesus. In 1874, a new house was founded in Ootacamund in the Vicariate of Coimbatore, under the direction of the Paris Foreign Mission Society. However, in Madurai, the dissensions became exacerbated to such an extent that, in 1876 some religious, among them Mary of the Passion, were driven to leave the Society of Mary Reparatrix, reuniting at Ootacamund under the jurisdiction of the Vicar Apostolic of Coimbatore, Mons. Joseph Bardon, M.E.P.
In November 1876, Mary of the Passion went to Rome to regularise the situation of the 20 separated sisters and on January 6, 1877, obtained the authorisation from Pius IX to found a new Institute which was to be specifically missionary and was to be called the "Missionaries of Mary". Her activity as a missionary would remain deeply marked by the years she had lived in India, having experienced first hand the conditions and difficulties of life on the missions.
Her intense activity drew its dynamism from contemplation of the great mysteries of faith. For Mary of the Passion, all led back to the Unity-Trinity of God truth-love, who communicates himself to us through the paschal mystery of Christ. It was in union with these mysteries that, in an ecclesial and missionary dimension, she lived her vocation of offering.
For her, Jesus in the Eucharist was "the great missionary" and availability to Mary in the readiness of her "Fiat" traced out for her the path of unconditional self-giving to the work of God. Thus she opened her Institute to the horizons of universal mission, accomplished in Francis of Assisi's evangelical spirit of simplicity, poverty and charity.
She took great care, not only of the external organisation of the works, but above all of the spiritual formation of the religious. Gifted with an extraordinary capacity for work, she found time to compose numerous writings on formation, while by frequent correspondence; she followed her daughters dispersed throughout the world, relentlessly calling them to a life of holiness"Surely when I was twenty-one I could not understand your wishes for my path in life, my God, nor what the term true power meant... . I can see true power resplendent: Truth and Charity: God communicating himself to the Church through the Holy Spirit".
Worn out by the fatigue of her constant journeys and daily labour, she died after a brief illness on November 15, 1904 in San Remo, Italy. Her mortal remains repose in a private oratory of the Institute's Motherhouse in Rome. The Congregation now has 7,700 sisters who are missionaries in 77 countries, on every continent.
In February 1918, in San Remo, the Informative Process was opened for the Cause. After the Consultors voted unanimously in its favour, the Decree for the Introduction of the Cause was published on January 19, 1979, with the approval of His Holiness John Paul II.
On June 28, 1999, the Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II solemnly promulgated the Decree on the heroicity of the virtues of Mother Mary of the Passion. On March 5, 2002, the healing of a religious, suffering from "pulmonary and vertebral TBC, Pott's Disease", was recognised as a miracle granted by God through the intercession of the Venerable Mary of the Passion. In April 23, 2002, in the presence of the Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II, the Decree for the Beatification of the Venerable Servant of God was promulgated.
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