Foundation Stones

For a week in Esopus, NY nine young men, recent graduates of Marist schools in Chicago, Brownsville, Tx, Roselle, NJ,Briarwood, NY, and the Bronx have been exploring the call to our Marist Brotherhood, our way of life, and its foundational roots in the Gospel and in the life of St. Marcellin Champagnat. They have experienced communal prayer, communal life, the customs and traditions which make us Marist, and lots of manual work, which was always part of St. Marcellin's own life and method of determining the sincerity of aspirants to the Little Brothers of Mary. Today, the young men will leave having made new friends and having experienced what it might mean for them to become a brother. The foundation stones have been laid, next the rest of the building.
It is a Saturday, traditionally dedicated to Mary, so we put these men and their futures into her hands as well as in the hands of St. Marcellin and three other great saints who led heroic lives, even to the point of martyrdom for two of them: Sts. Paulinus of Nola, bishop of that city; John Fisher and Thomas More, who stood against the wishes of King Henry VIII and lost their heads in return for their fidelity to the teachings of the Church. As St. Thomas More put it, "I die as the king's good servant, but God's first". May the example of these holy men inspire ours to put God's will ahead of theirs, for truly, "we need brothers!"
Bro. Rene