Life of the Congregation

Disseminating the spirituality of St Michael Garicoits is a mission each Betharramite religious is called to.  So it is a great joy when we see lay people being committed to this mission with generosity and dedication.

After the translation of the three volumes of the Correspondence of St. Michael Garicoits, completed in 2013 and published on the website of the Congregation, Mario Grugnola has been back to service by working one of the most important volumes on the Saint of Betharram written by Father Pierre Duvignau SCJ in 1962.

After over than 50 years after its release in France, the volume by Fr. Duvignau SCJ is a new entry in the Italian Betharramite library ; it is still a reference book for those who want to know more about the life and the spirituality of St Michael Garicoits and is often quoted in our lectures.

In 1962, Fr. Duvignau dared to entitle his book dedicated to our founder as follows: A spiritual master of the nineteenth century. He admitted in his introduction that such a title was “rather ambitious [and that] Fr. Garicoits, so humble, would certainly have declined it.”

Yet, at the beginning of the XXI century, St Michael Garicoits is still indeed the father and/or the spiritual guide of religious and lay people worldwide. Hence, the Italian publishers did not hesitate to update the frontage as follows : “San Michele Garicoïts - Un Maestro spirituale per il nostro tempo”, that is “Saint Michael Garicoits, a spiritual master for our time”. There is no way Fr. Duvignau would have disapproved that!