The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1918-09-21

establishing sodalities of the Blessed
Virgin in all countries, in all dioceses
and in every parish thereof, is not a
new project, will be readily proven
from the fact that in the year 1853 a
Belgian Father, John Leunis, con-
ceiyed the plan of fostering piety
among his pupils by means of a
sodality. At the end of class each
afternoon they met before an altar of
Mary and occupied themselves with
prayer, singing, spiritual reading and
listening to instruction. In 1857 rules
were written binding the members to
go to Communion at least once a
month and to adopt many other vol
untary pious practices. A priest was
appointed spiritual director and from
among the older and more sensible
members Project was chosen, whose
duty it was to select twelve overseers
or Promoters, and to entrust to each
a section of the Sodality, so that
none, if possible, might ever be guilty
of bad conduct or of negligence.
These members of the first Roman
Sodality of Our Lady soon became
distinguished in their studies and
work, in their general conduct as we'll
as in their piety.
The sense of having bound them
selves, not indeed to do heroic deeds,
but to perform their regular duties
more faithfully and regularly, and of
having one another as companions in
| goodness, protected the members
against human respect, that foe of
all that is high and noble, and against
| the weakness and fickleness of char
acter which it natural to youth. Thus
| these members soon grew fast in
| favor, and so won public esteem and
made such rapid progress in all that
is good and Catholic that branches
spread to other cities. Already in
1875, but thirteen years later, sodall-
ties were spread to Paris and Prague;
| to Cologne in 1875, to Barcelona in
1877. to Freiburg in 1881, to Lisbon
! in 1888, everywhere with the same re-
| suits.
The Sovereign Pontiffs themselves
| IOOh cat IllClCOI III I1lSoC cOuoAtAOoj
| were enrolled as members and granted
| them many indulgences.
This will suffice to prove that So
| dalities are not new, and that the
present effort of bishops is but to
arouse the faithful from a state of
drowsiness, and to urge them to
realize the necessity and usefulness
| of sodalities. In 1851 we find Bene-
| dict XIV giving faculties for the
| aggregation of sodalities of girls and
! women to the Prima Primaria So
dality, Rome, which had SO far been
only for boys and men,
Until 1925 only sodalities under
Jesuit direction could be affiliated
with the Prima Primaria, but on the
| seventh of May of that year Pope
Leo XII opened, its doors to all So
| dalities wherever in the world. In
the next so years no less than 34,722
sodalities were added to this mother
| sodality. At present the total of
| aggregations reaches nearly to the
| $4,000 mark. These sodalities, estab-
| lished at first for boys and men,
soon included all classes, and it is the
| erroneous opinion of many today to
| imagine that sodalities are exclusively
| for young ladies. Plus TX, Leo XIII,
Plus X and the present Holy Father,
| Benedict XIV, have prided themselves
on being members of thu Blessed Vir-
| gin Sodality, Leo XIII even solemnly
celebrating his seventy-fifth anniver-
| sary as a member of the Sodality of
| the Blessed Virgin. Most prominent
men and. women of all ages and sta
lions in life, from kings and poten-
tates to those in the humblest walks
| of life, have ever been and are at
| present found enrolled on the register
of this sodality. Such is very brief
| history of the sodality.
Req c. Norman.