The Ten Virtues of Mary

The Order of the Annonciade (1) was founded by a French princess. At age five, in 1469, the daughter of King Louis XI, Saint Joan of France, had a vision of the Virgin Mary inviting her to found a religious order in her honor. However, events took a different turn and Joan was married at the age of twelve. She had to wait until her marriage was annulled in 1502 to found the monastic Order of the Sisters of the Annonciade (Annunciation) in Bourges, France.

Establishing a new religious order wasn’t easy. Joan sought the help of her confessor, the Franciscan Brother Gabriel-Maria, who wrote the rule of the order. It was centered on three simple ideas: 

1. Seek God

2. Walk in Mary’s footsteps

3. Imitate Mary’s ten virtues mentioned in the Bible (2)

The Pope officially approved the rule in 1517 and the Order was launched. It spread rapidly in France and Europe, but it also had to deal with the conflicts of the times: the Wars of Religion in the 16th century, the Thirty Years War in the 17th century and, of course, the French Revolution. More than a thousand Annonciade nuns suffered a tragic fate, from exile to prison and the guillotine...

After the Revolution, two of the former sisters recreated the community with a boarding school in France. In 1904, anticlerical laws were voted, and the nuns were forced into exile again. The Annonciades returned to France in 1922 and settled permanently in Thiais (a town in the suburbs of Paris) in 1926.

The monastery of Thiais has grown steadily since, adding new communities in the 1970s:

- Saint-Doulchard, in Normandy (1988)

- Menton, in the Alpes (2000)

- Poland* (2009).

1) Annonciade

2) The Ten Virtues of Mary:

I. Mary's humility; II. Of Mary's love of God; III. Of Mary's charity towards her neighbor; IV. Of Mary's faith; V. Of Mary's hope; VI. Of Mary's chastity; VII. Of Mary's poverty; VIII. Of Mary's obedience; IX. Of Mary's patience; X. Of Mary's spirit of prayer.

*The Annonciade congregation is closely linked to Saint Stanislaus Papczyński, Polish founder of the Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception. See: Marian Fathers

Adapted from: Paris Vox