CONGREGATION OF JESUS AND MARY (EUDISTS). - Founded in the 17th century by St. ETUDES (v.), this Congregation is contemporary with three other famous French institutions: the Oratory, the Congregation of the Mission, and the Society of St. Sulpice, with which it shares an identical community of purpose and organization. Like the Oratorians, the Lazarists, and the Sulpicians, the Eudists have as their essential aim the formation of the clergy in seminaries according to the directives of the Council of Trent. After long prayers, and also encouraged by the advice of illustrious figures, among whom Cardinal Richelieu, he established in Caen in Normandy, on 25 March 1643, the Congregation of Jesus and Mary to direct those seminaries where ordinands were to be formed in the virtues proper to their state.
Cardinal de Bérulle, Olier, and St. Vincent de Paul, founders respectively of the Oratory, the Sulpicians, and the Lazarists, had not deemed it expedient to bind the members of their institutions with religious vows, so as to allow them to work under the immediate jurisdiction of the diocesan bishops whose clergy they were to form. Following their example, St. John Eudes made of his institute not a religious congregation properly so called, but an ecclesiastical congregation, of the kind that canon law would later term “Societates virorum in communi viventium sine votis” [societies of men living in common without vows]. In the mind of the founder, this had not only a practical but also a mystical reason. He well knew that bishops would willingly entrust their seminaries only to priests entirely subject to their jurisdiction: free, therefore, from the religious vows that bind regulars and distance them from episcopal authority.
The government of the Congregation was modeled on that of the Oratory, to which the founder himself had previously belonged. The supreme authority resides in the general assembly, which elects the superior general and meets periodically to oversee administration. Between assemblies, the superior general, who is appointed for life, holds supreme power in the Congregation and is assisted by assistants, appointed by the assembly, who have decisive power with the general in matters of an administrative nature, and only a consultative role in other matters.
At the death of St. John Eudes (19 Aug. 1660), the institute was directing six very important seminaries in Normandy and Brittany: Caen, Lisieux, Rouen, Coutances, Évreux, and Rennes. Subsequently, the Eudists were called to other parts of France, mainly in the center and west, so that on the eve of the Revolution they were directing some twenty diocesan seminaries. The Congregation received its decree of praise on 25 July 1851.
To inspire the greatest esteem in seminarians for their vocation, Eudes wished to institute a special feast in honor of the “Priesthood of Jesus Christ and the holy priests and levites.” The office and Mass, entirely composed by him and approved by several bishops, exalted the excellence of the priesthood and recalled the examples of all the saints of the ecclesiastical order. Another service rendered to the Church by the Eudists was their intrepid struggle against Jansenism. When the Civil Constitution of the Clergy forced priests to choose between their faith and freedom, few of the clergy formed by the Eudists defected, while the overwhelming majority remained faithful to the See of Peter; others sealed their attachment to the Church with their blood. Of the 191 priests killed in hatred of the faith in Paris in the prison of the Carmelites (September 1792), 42 had been students of the Eudists. The Congregation itself numbers among its members 4 martyrs, including its superior general, Fr. Habert, confessor to King Louis XVI, who were beatified by Pius XI in October 1926. In 1816, the survivors of the revolutionary storm were able to reconstitute themselves into a regular community. It was too late, however, to resume direction of the seminaries that had in the meantime been entrusted to other religious institutions. Thus the Eudists were able to pursue their secondary purpose: missionary apostolate in the countryside and teaching in colleges.
In this way there arose houses in Rennes, Redon, Versailles, Valognes, and Besançon. During the religious persecutions of 1880 under Ferry and of 1903 under Combes, the Eudists were expelled from France, where they were able to return only after 1918. The persecution, however, had an unexpected and excellent result. Exiled from their homeland, the Eudists went to North and South America, where they continued their work of forming the clergy in seminaries. In Canada and Latin America they have been able to organize promising provinces. The Canadian province, with many houses including the regional seminary of Halifax, is in full development; similarly, the province of Colombia-Venezuela, where the fathers direct a dozen seminaries and carry out missionary and parochial ministry, bringing everywhere a breath of new life. Recently, at the pressing appeal of the bishops, they have established themselves in Brazil and Chile. The Congregation of the Eudists has never been very numerous. It numbers little more than 500 members. Their literary activity was first of all limited to practical works for ecclesiastical teaching in their formation houses. Nevertheless, in the field of spirituality and in the history of devotion to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, they have made a noteworthy contribution universally recognized. Moreover, their studies on the life and works of St. John Eudes have contributed to the clarification of many points in the rich and intricate history of the 17th century.