Saint Marguerite Bourgeoys Religious Medal "EXCLUSIVE"

Saint Marguerite Bourgeoys (17 April 1620 12 January 1700, feast day: January 12) was born the sixth of twelve children of devout parents. When Marguerite was 19 her mother died and the young lady cared for her brothers and sisters. Her father, a candle maker died when she was twenty-seven. A few years later, the governor of Montreal, Canada, Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve was in France looking for teachers for the New World. He invited Marguerite to come to Montreal to teach school and religion classes. She accepted the offer. Marguerite gave away her share of her inheritance from her parents to other members of the family and, in 1653, sailed for New France. On arriving, she initiated the construction of the Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel in honour of Our Lady of Good Help (Our Lady of Perpetual Help). She opened her first school in 1658 and sailed back to France in 1659 in order to recruit more teachers, and returned with four. In 1670, she went to France again, and brought back six more women. These women braved dangerous travel and were to become the first Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame. Marguerite and her sisters helped people in the colony survive when food was scarce, opened a vocational school, taught young people how to run a home and farm. Marguerite's congregation grew to 18 sisters, seven of them Canadian. They opened missions, and two sisters taught at the Native American school. Soon after, Marguerite received the first two Native American women into the congregation. In 1693, Mother Marguerite handed over her congregation to her successor, Marie Barbier, the first Canadian to join the order. The congegration's religious rule was approved by the Church in 1698, and Marguerite spent her last few years praying and writing an autobiography. On December 31, 1699, a young sister lay dying and Mother Marguerite asked God to take her life in exchange. By the next morning of January 1, 1700, the sister was completely well, Mother Marguerite had a raging fever, suffered 12 days, and died on January 12, 1700. She was declared venerable in 1878, beatified on 12 November, 1950, and canonised by John Paul II on 31 October, 1982. She is commemorated in both the Catholic Church and in the Anglican Church of Canada on January 12. She is buried in the sanctuary of Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel in Montreal, which also houses a museum about her life and the early history of Montreal.