When asked by a novice why she, their foundress, was being kept in such lowly status and work conditions, Bl. Marie-Anne responded, “The deeper a tree sinks its roots into the soil, the greater are its chances of growing and producing fruit.” She offered her trials and tribulations in prayer for her congregation. She believed that “there is more happiness in forgiving than in seeking revenge.”
Welcome to "North American Sanctity," a new series on holy men and women, boys and girls, saints and those on the road to sainthood, from Canada, the United States, and Mexico. Some will be familiar, others less so; but all are inspiring!
By Kimberly Bruce
Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin’s life was one of obedience.
Reduced to a “zero,” as she put it in her own words, Bl. Marie-Anne (feast day April 18) was the foundress of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Anne in Vaudreuil, Québec, Canada.
Her life, lived in obedience to “God rather than the world,” was “an example of generous giving” in service to others, according to the Vatican’s notification for her beatification (the second step in the process of canonization to become a saint).
Illiterate but wise
Born Esther Blondin to pious Catholic parents in Terrebonne, Québec, on April 18, 1809, Bl. Marie-Anne was the third of 12 children. She was illiterate until the day she died — not unusual for those in her area in the 19th century.
She became a boarder at a convent at the age of 23. Initially, she was there to learn to read and write. She then entered the novitiate, but soon had to leave due to health reasons.
Becoming a Catholic school teacher in Vaudreuil, a suburb of Montréal, she learned that a Church ruling existed requiring boys and girls to be separated for education after the age of 10. Boys then were only to be taught by men, girls by women.
Many churches, as a result, chose to have no schools due to the costs of maintaining two separate ones. This was the reason for the high degree of illiteracy amongst her people.
Deeply convicted to do something about this, Bl. Marie-Anne approached her Bishop, the Most Rev. Ignace Bourget of Montréal, to begin a congregation whose work would be to educate boys and girls in the same school. Not wanting this, but because the state favored this type of schooling, Bishop Bourget chose to allow it.
Holy obedience
At age 41, Bl. Marie-Anne became Mother Superior of her new Congregation of the Sisters of St. Anne. Because of its substantial growth in just three short years, the bishop transferred the congregation in 1853 to larger quarters at St. Jacques de l’Achigan, under the chaplaincy of Fr. Louis Adolphe Marechal.
Due to Fr. Marechal’s incessant and often cruel interference in the life of this Congregation, Fr. Marechal and Mother Marie-Anne were at odds. A year later, the bishop asked Mother to resign. He also went so far as to order Mother “not to accept the superiorship, even if her sisters wanted to re-elect her,” which they did, several times over, during the ensuing years.
Even though Bl. Marie-Anne could have chosen to remain as Mother Superior, due to her Congregation’s reelection of her, she chose instead to obey her bishop.
Our Lord’s messages to St. Faustina speak of this same obedience that Bl. Marie-Anne honored so well:
Then I heard the following words in my soul: You will receive a greater reward for your obedience and subjection to your confessor than you will for the practices which you will be carrying out. Know this, My daughter, and act accordingly: anything, no matter how small it be, that has the seal of obedience to My representative is pleasing to Me and great in My eyes (Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska, 933.)
Jesus also told her:
When you are obedient I take away your weakness and replace it with My strength. I am very surprised that souls do not want to make that exchange with Me (Diary, 381).
Saint Faustina further wrote that the interior sufferings she withstood for a particular two years in submission to God’s will, “advanced me further in perfection than the previous ten years” (Diary, 981).
Humility
Blessed Marie-Anne was then named directress at another convent, but because of Fr. Marechal’s continued attacks against her, she was ordered to return to the congregation she had founded. There she was reduced to working in the basement laundry room for the remaining 32 years of her life.
When asked by a novice why she, their foundress, was being kept in such lowly status and work conditions, she responded, “The deeper a tree sinks its roots into the soil, the greater are its chances of growing and producing fruit.” She offered her trials and tribulations in prayer for her congregation. She believed that “there is more happiness in forgiving than in seeking revenge.”
She remained in peace, trusting God, saying, “He will know well, in His Wisdom, how to discern the false from the true and to reward each one according to his deeds.”
Examination of conscience
We are all called to obedience with respect to our vocation in life and with respect to following the teachings of the Catholic Church, the Church Christ founded. How well do we do this? Do we partially obey, obeying some things, but not others? Do we come to be reconciled with God when we have not been obedient by means of His merciful gift of the Sacrament of Reconciliation?
Blessed Marie-Anne knew well the graces that would flow from being obedient. On her deathbed, her parting words were, “May the Eucharist and abandonment to the will of God be your heaven on earth.” She died on Jan. 2, 1890.
Because of her heroic holiness, she was declared Venerable in 1991 and beatified by Pope St. John Paul II in 2001.
Today, the Sisters of Saint Anne serve in Canada and the United States, where they have established schools and hospitals, as well as missions in third world countries.
Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin, pray for us!
Next in the series: Saint Marie of the Incarnation, April 30.
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