CHAMPAGNAT, Marcellin, Venerable. — Founder of the Institute of the Little Brothers of Mary (q.v.), or Marist Brothers, born at Marlhes (diocese of Lyon) on 20 May 1789, died at the Hermitage near St-Chamand on 6 June 1840.
To come to the aid of youth abandoned by their parents and often betrayed by the secular and irreligious school, he gathered around him brothers who would then be sent out as teachers to various parishes; and despite difficulties and opposition of every kind, he succeeded admirably.
A fellow seminarian of the Venerable Fr. Colin, founder of the Marist Fathers, he shared his aspirations and gave his name to the Society of Mary once he learned of its approval by the Holy See, uniting his brothers to II. These, at the invitation of Rome, were later erected into an autonomous institute and rapidly spread throughout the world.
Champagnat was a man of exemplary piety, cherishing a tender devotion to the Blessed Virgin, whom he called “our ordinary resource,” and always practiced great austerity of life. He deeply instilled this spirit in his brothers, leaving them, in addition to the constitutions (1st ed., 1837) approved by Pius IX on 9 January 1863, detailed directives for their spiritual and intellectual formation, and for the Christian education of youth according to the principles of the wisest pedagogy, which at the time was almost entirely unknown. The cause of beatification is underway, and the decree on the heroicity of his virtues dates to 11 July 1920.