By 1838

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Part 9 Growing together

• By 1838
• the Marist Sisters were well established in
  Belley.
• Since 1826,
• 44 young women had professed their vows
• in Marys little congregation.
• They came from Coutouvre,
• where Jeanne-Marie Chavoin grew up
• from Cerdon,
• where she and Marie Jotillon
• made the first foundation
• from Belley
• and its surrounding district
• and from St Chamond
• near where Marcellin Champagnat and
• other Marist Fathers ministered.

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in spite of difficulties
Those early years brought hardship there was
the poverty of their own surroundings and of the
people the sisters wished to help. Most of the
children they taught and those they took in as
boarders were unable to pay their way. So there
was the struggle to make ends meet requiring
the sisters to sew whenever they had spare
time. And there was illness Sadly, a number of
sisters died young. By 1840, the foundress had
buried 16 of the women in whom she hoped for
the future. Most were under 30 years of age, one
was only 14
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and even grief

• One of the deaths was that of
• Sr Marie Jotillon,
• first companion of the foundress.
• As Maries body was carried
• out of the house,
• Mother St Joseph was heard to say
• Half of myself
• is leaving the community today.
• It was also said
• To bear this heavy cross
• she had need of all her courage
• and conformity to the will of God.

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the congregation expanded

• It happened that around the time of Sr Maries
  death,
• a long-awaited permission was received
• for the Marist Sisters to make a foundation in
  the thriving city of Lyon.
• Lyon was an obvious choice
• a city well-connected to the rest of the world by
  road and waterways
• a business centre attracting the rich
  middle-class generous to charitable requests
• an intellectual domain with a history of 2000
  years and an excellent university.
• Furthermore, Lyon was a Catholic stronghold,
• especially dear to the hearts of the early
  Marists.
• Not only had devotion to Mary
• been characteristic of its people for centuries
• but this was the city
• watched over by Our Lady of Fourvière
• to whom the first aspirants of the Society of
  Mary
• had made their Solemn Pledge
• a little more than 20 years earlier.

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because our foundress put her trust in God!

• She used to say
• We must have confidence,
• God is not dead!
• We must count on Providence,
• it has never let us down
• and it will not fail us today.
• God will come to our help.
• She took God at his word
• as Mary did!

Part 10 of the Jeanne-Marie Chavoin Story will be
published in April