Ad Honorem Immaculatae Conceptionis Mariae Oblatio

41 ed by the Marians as slightly unconvincing. Therefore, she presented her own opinion, saying that in the 17 th Century, the change of habit meant the emergence of a new religious order. To an extent, this is a natural outlook, supported by common sense and the sensitivity of an average person who, upon seeing a new and unknown habit, was bound to wonder what was this new religious and what Order did he belong to. Therefore, the change of the Piarist habit for the Marian can and should be recognized as the origin of the Marians, if not for the fact that the Founder himself considered the donning of the white habit only as an out- ward addition to the earlier and more significant event, i.e. his Oblatio . Ac- cording to Fr. Papczyński’s intentions, the entire rite of the Oblatio was to have had a solemn character and to be held at the Wawel Cathedral on the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the BVM. 15 The strong objec- tions of the Piarist Superiors caused both his dispensation from vows and the Oblatio to be a very modest in camera event with only a few people in attendance, held at the Piarist House chapel a few days after the originally planned date and without the changing of the habit to the white one. The change of the habit had to be postponed several months until the Bish- op’s permission and the Nuncio’s consent were obtained. Yet, the act of the Oblatio and the change of the habit are closely linked internally and are a unity. Therefore, the manner of interpreting the events proposed by M. Borkowska consequently leads to the Oblatio as the beginning of the Congregation of Marian Fathers. The factors that prepared the birth of a new tradition Many factors impacted the shaping of the 20 th -Century Marians’ out- look on the beginning of their Congregation. It seems that the most impor- tant ones among them were: the interpretation of the 17 th -Century events in the light of the 20 th -Century legal norms and Church practices; the rela- tively late discovery – only in 1962 – of the text of St. Papczyński’s Oblatio ; little interest in history and meager efforts made to this extent; and the administrative appointment of the year 1973 to hold the celebrations of the 300 th Anniversary of the Congregation. These factors differ in nature and their impact on the shaping of the new tradition. Perhaps, if they had 15 Posnaniensis Beatificationis et Canonisationis Servi Dei Stanislai a ]esu Maria Papczynski Positio , Romae 1977, 191 nn.