It is essential that the Archives staff preserve the history, charism, and traditions of the IHM Congregation, most especially to keep alive the memory of our IHM Sisters, both living and deceased. We stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us, as we continue to strive to be, like them, a living expression of our founding Charism of Love, Creative Hope, and Fidelity. We trust that Divine Providence will guide us!
Happy I.H.M. Founders Day
November 10, 2020
Today, November 10, 2020, we celebrate our IHM Founders Day. We jubilantly praise and thank God for this very SPECIAL Founders Day, as we rejoice in our 175th. Anniversary as a Religious Congregation. With deep gratitu
de we remember our Co-Founders, Rev. Louis Florent Gillet, a Redemptorist Priest, and Mother Theresa Maxis, one of our first
Sisters. Mother Maria Alma Ryan, I.H.M. recounts: “On the morning of November 10, 1845, the three women (Mary Maxis, Charlotte Martha Schaaf, and Therese Renauld) met in the Church (in Monroe, Michigan) to attend Holy Mass celebrated by Father Gillet for the guidance of the p
roject so dear to all of them. After Mass he returned to the sanctuary in surplice and stole, offered a prayer of oblation and rested the stole upon the shoulder of each.” (Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary 1845-1967.)
Pictured with the Founders’ photos are treasured artifacts. Mother Theresa’s Rosary was saved after Mother’s death in Villa Maria, West Chester on January 14, 1892. Father Gillet’s Rosary was sent from a Cistercian Monastery in Hautecombe, France after his death there on November 14, 1892. The small log cabin is a replica of the original foundation log cabin in Monroe, Michigan.
Obviously, further research will fill in the gaps of the mysteries and the miracles of this foundation, moving forward to the present day reality under the guidance and protection of Divine Providence!
Photos:
“Louis Gillet, Who Is Like Fire”
1997 Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
Monroe, Michigan
Iconographer: Nancy Lee Smith, IHM
Photographer: Jim Wedlake
“Mother Theresa Maxis, The Holder of the Fire”
1995 Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
Monroe, Michigan
Iconographer: Nancy Lee Smith, IHM
Photographer: William Glaab