Founder Timeline
1782
Charles Joseph Eugene de Mazenod was born in Aix-en-Provence in the south of France on August 1.
1791
During the French Revolution Eugene and his family were forced into exile in Italy.
1792
He made his first holy communion in Turin on Holy Thursday, April 5, and received the Sacrament of Confirmation on June 13.
1794
The family fled to Venice where Eugene came under the influence of Don Bartolo Zinelli, who became his educator and mentor. Eugene’s mother and sister returned to France, from where she divorced her husband.
1797
Eugene and his father fled to Naples, and then to Sicily. Here Eugene became closely associated with the noble Cannizzaro family, and rediscovered his sense of being a nobleman.
1802
After eleven years of exile in Italy, he left Palermo to return to France on October 11, at the age of 20. He began to live with his mother in a rather aimless aristocratic lifestyle.
Good Friday
During the adoration of the cross one Good Friday, probably in 1807, Eugene realized that he had looked for happiness everywhere, except in God’s love. This conversion experience began his life journey of “living only for God.”
1808
Eugene entered the seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris.
1811
Ordination as a priest by Bishop Demandolx in Amiens, on December 21.
1813
Series of Lenten homilies to the poor of Aix in their local Provencal language, in the Church of Saint Mary Magdalene.
1816
On January 25, Eugene began to live together with a group of four other priests in order to share community life. They were then called the Missionaries of Provence.
1818
The Missionaries drew up a Rule of life, made vows and became a religious congregation of priests and brothers.
1822
While praying before the statue of Mary Immaculate, on August 15, he received a mystical grace of re-assurance that his foundation of Missionaries was God’s will and that they would bear much fruit in the future.
1823
Eugene was appointed vicar general of the diocese of Marseilles on July 6.
1826
Eugene was in Rome when the Congregation was approved by Pope Leo XII on February 17. The name was changed to Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
1832
Consecrated a bishop in Rome on October 14.
1837
Became the Bishop of Marseilles on December 27.
1854
Bishop de Mazenod participated in the declaration of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, held in Rome.
1861
Death on May 21, in Marseilles.
1926
The diocesan process for his beatification began in Marseilles.
1975
Pope Paul VI proclaimed Eugene de Mazenod a blessed on October 19, 1975, in St Peter’s Square in Rome.
1995
On December 3, the first Sunday of Advent, John Paul II proclaimed Eugene de Mazenod a saint.