Bernardine Of Esquermes

BERNARDINE DI ESQUERMES. – Three French Cistercian religious women, expelled by the Revolution and returned to their homeland in 1797, determined to live together and opened a boarding school in Douai, which two years later they transferred to Esquermes, near Lille. In 1827 an attempt was made to bring the Esquermes community back to observance of the Cistercian rule, but the boarding school, which in the meantime had greatly expanded, was scarcely compatible with the demands of an eminently contemplative life. New constitutions were therefore drawn up, approved by the Holy See in 1901, and other houses were opened in other cities, so that today the Institute numbers eight, with approximately 300 religious women devoted to the instruction and education of young women.

Silverio Mattei