WORK OF THE YOUTH. - In 1790, in the midst of the French Revolution, Fr. G. G. Allemand laid the foundations in Marseilles of a new form of religious life that foreshadowed the modern secular institutes, recently recognized in canonical form.
The purpose is to gather young people, particularly workers, at fixed times and hours to educate them in the Christian way. The members do not wear a special habit and live in their own homes, engaged in secular professions and business, so as to escape more easily any external control; but they come together for acts of piety. They take vows of chastity, obedience, and zeal for the sanctification of youth; they do not take a vow of poverty unless, having withdrawn from business, they live in the houses of the Institute and obtain permission to take II. For this reason, there are also some establishments where community life is lived.
The Institute was canonically erected in 1821 and received a decree of praise in 1863. It was then approved by the Holy See in 1865, and in 1871 its Constitutions were definitively approved; these were revised again in 1942. Today it has 5 houses with 35 members.