Ad Honorem Immaculatae Conceptionis Mariae Oblatio

38 General’s street address (to 38 Via dei Rammi) was carefully noted, which confirms the fact that all information was scrupulously brought up to day annually. Not a single word was said about the earlier Papal approvals. The information containing the aforesaid dates (and only these dates) was pub- lished up to and including 1935. This would suggest that Fr. C. Reklaitis, while editing his Krótki przeglqd historii Zgromadzenia Marianów in 1934 , deliberately changed the date of the Congregation’s origin from the previ- ously given 1673 to 1670. It is difficult to uncover the reasons for why he did it, since he never explained the change of his views. However, he was consistent in his views because, starting from 1935, he always gave the year 1670 as the date of the founding of the Congregation. 8 In the following years – up until his leaving from Rome for America in 1941 – he persisted in his conviction. For an uninterrupted period of six years (1936-1941), the Annuario pontificio provided the year 1670 as the date of origin of the Con- gregation of Marian Fathers. However, this changed in 1942, as the date of 1673 returned and remained for the subsequent years. From the Annuario pontificio ’s point of view, the tradition of giving 1673 as the date of the Marian Congregation’s origin has continued uninterrupted since 1942. The Marians’ perception of the community’s origin in the 1960s In 1961, Fr. E. Makulski, MIC, then a student of Church History at the Catholic University of Lublin, came up with an important initiative to re- store the dilapidating Church of Our Lord’s Cenacle in Góra Kalwaria. At first, the idea was discussed by priest students in Lublin, but consequently a fervent appeal was sent to religious houses with several residents. 9 This extensive document substantiated the need for a speedy beginning of the Cenacle’s restoration. Some of the arguments used at the time are inter- esting. They show the author’s ideas about the beginning of the Congre- gation (or rather, the authors, i.e. the student priests). They also indirect- ly show the level of collective awareness of the Marians, the recipients of this appeal. The archives of the house in Góra Kalwaria contain a copy of the type-set appeal with corrections on some pages, hand-written either by Fr. E. Makulski personally or one of his co-operators. Here is what the author (or authors) of this appeal wrote about the origin and rise of the 8 Ibid, 1936, 649. 9 E. Makulski, Grobowiec zalożyciela marianów, Góra Kalwaria 1961, pp. 19, mps (parish archives in Góra Kalwaria).