Hélène de Chappotin (1839—1904) et les Franciscaines missionnaires de Marie, “Oser sa vie.” (review)

Abstract

Hélène de Chappotin (in religious life, Marie de la Passion), foundress of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary and a candidate for beatification, was fond of saying that she had the blood of Dominic de Guzman flowing through her veins. This bit of family history probably gave her a strong sense of historical-rootedness. But it also likely helped her to face a host of personal challenges, including the untimely death of her mother (precipitated by her decision to enter religious life), conflicts she had with superiors when she directed Reparatrice convents in India, and her decision to found a new religious order. The reward today, almost one hundred years after her death, is a thriving international religious society that counts 8,200 female missionaries of seventy-two different nationalities, at work on all continents, in a total of seventy-six countries.