Apostolate

"The first apostolate and the Primary source of all holiness is the Sacred Liturgy of the Church."

POPE SAINT PIUS X

“The first apostolate and the primary source of all holiness is the Sacred Liturgy of the Church.” (Pope St. Pius X)

Filled with a great love of the Church, Dom Adrien Gréa founded the Canons Regular of the Immaculate Conception in 1871 in the Jura region of France. He saw that the religious life and the priestly life perfect and reinforce one another. With a spirituality which is that of the Church expressed through the richness of the Sacred Liturgy and through a filial devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, we live this ideal through our life in common and our work in parishes.

Since the divine plan of salvation calls believers to become saints, our pastoral activity undertakes the long journey of Christian life and holiness. Within the parishes entrusted to our care — supported by a religious life lived in community — we carry out our pastoral tasks and administer the sacraments that Jesus Christ entrusted to his Apostles and their successors for the good of His Church.
 

Faithful to the Canonical tradition and to our Founder Dom Gréa, we give pride of place to our Liturgical Apostolate.

Because the liturgy is “the first and indispensable source of the true Christian spirit” (Pope St. Pius X: Motu Proprio, “Tra le sollicitudini”), the care of the places of worship and of all liturgical furnishings is diligently carried out. Great attention is given to the preparation and celebration of all aspects of the liturgy and devotions.

We endeavor to help our faithful to imbue their personal and community devotions and their whole life of prayer with the liturgical spirit. We invite the faithful to take an active part in the Divine Office (Liturgy of the Hours) as it is the prayer of the whole Christian people.

We renew and enrich the traditional exercises of piety, such as Eucharistic Adoration, the public recitation of the Holy Rosary, Lenten Stations of the Cross, Eucharistic and Marian processions, novenas, etc., as well as the popular blessings and other sacramentals.
 

MISSIONARY APOSTOLATE
Because everything in the accomplishment of God’s plan begins with faith, our first duty is to evangelize through preaching and so proclaim Jesus Christ and His Kingdom. We want to dissipate the darkness of ignorance and error and thus go before the Lord to prepare the way for Him: “I should be punished if I did not preach it” (1 Cor 9:16).

Even though we never finish announcing the Good News to those who have already received and accepted the Message, there is, nevertheless, the vast number of those who ignore it and even those who fight against it. Proclaiming the Message and seeking unceasingly how to spread the Word in order to prepare minds and hearts to embrace the faith, makes us reflect and seek and act constantly with both courage and burning love. We do this with the constant concern of being for everyone, those who announce the Kingdom by word and by example.

 

MNISTRY OF SANCTIFICATION AND OF SALVATION
In order for this ministry of sanctification and of salvation to bear fruit, it requires, first of all, our own holiness and a charity, that never consents to lower itself to the standards of either mediocrity or indifference, but instead makes us into devoted brothers and ardent servants, possessing both patience and hope.

Our religious life, which aims at making us witnesses of our vows of poverty, chastity and obedience in the midst of the Christian People, and more particularly in the midst of the clergy, receives from its pastoral involvement a profound significance; one that increases its interior worth and fervor, maintained by a life of prayer and penance.