53 informative preface Informative Preface1 1. This Congregation of the Immaculate Conception, about which we provide to you, most benevolent reader, this information, was canonically erected in the eremitical status2 by Bishop Stephen Wierzbowski, Ordinary of Poznań and Archbishop-elect of Gniezno, who has laudably passed through this life. The Congregation was endowed with certain indulgences and a Confraternity by the Most Holy Father Pope Innocent XI of happy memory,3 and it was approved and assumed in perpetual protection by the most august and invincible Prince John III, most happily reigning King of Poland4 together with the whole Polish Republic in the General Diet celebrated in Warsaw in 1677.5 1 This Preface was written by St. Stanislaus Papczyński, probably in 1697 when the Marians were getting the Rule of Life ready for publication. In fact, on February 20, 1698, they obtained the necessary imprimatur from Bishop N. Popławski, but the text was not printed, because after the death of Bishop Witwicki (March 4, 1698), the Marians decided to try once again to obtain pontifical approval for their Institute (the present Norma Vitae would have had to be updated if this effort were to meet with success). 2 The date of the canonical erection: April 21, 1679. See the text of the document in Positio, pp. 392-400. 3 The reference is made to the breve “Cum sicut accepimus” of March 20, 1681. This was the first pontifical recognition of the Marians. In fact, it is difficult to see in the breve of the indulgences the asserted concession of a Confraternity of the Marians. It is true that the text contains the phrase “Confraternity of the Faithful,” but it seems that it crept into it only by the inadvertence of the one who was writing the breve. Nonetheless, Bishop Wierzbowski (and the Marians) concluded from this phrase that the Holy See gave permission to establish a Confraternity. Accordingly, from that time on, the Marians started to erect the “Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception Assisting the Souls of the Faithful Departed” at their own churches; cf. below, Ch. VII, n. 8. See the text of the breve in Positio, pp. 404-409. 4 Saint Stanislaus speaks here about King John Sobieski (1674-1696). 5 The document of the Approval is published in Positio, pp. 376-378.
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