Ven. Mary Ward is a reminder of all those saints whose lonely struggles failed to surmount the obstacles in their path and whose dreams had to be entrusted to future generations. As a young woman in Elizabethan England (where practice of the Catholic faith was treason)
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she conceived the idea of a female institute, modeled on the Jesuits--living in non-enclosed community, free of episcopal authority, engaging in apostolic work in the world. In Belgium she found a confessor who supported her plan. So she sneaked back to England to find recruits.
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There she was arrested and sentenced to death--though reprieved and sent into exile. Back in Europe she formed her followers into a community and sought approval from Rome. She made initial progress, esp support for her plan for schools for girls, but most bishops opposed her.
Her institute was mocked as a house of "Lady Jesuits." In 1631 word came that her institute was suppressed; she was taken into custody on the charge of being "a heretic, schismatic, and rebel to the Holy Church." In broken health she returned to England. She died in Jan 1645.
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In 1703 her Institute was approved. "I think dear child the trouble and the long loneliness you hear me speak of is not far from me, which whensoever it is, happy success will follow...The pain is great, but very endurable, because He who lays on the burden also carries it."
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