Your fruit will remain

227 religious in three houses, of which, more than half of the members were in Poland. After his nomination as Bishop of Vilnius in 1918, Fr. Matulaitis – Matulewicz remained Superior General till his death. Before that, he appointed vicars general for the individual countries. In his report to the Apostolic See in 1923 on the state of the Congregation, Fr. Matulaitis – Matulewicz wrote that there were 94 religious in all, 48 residing in Poland, 31 in Lithuania and 15 in the USA. The same year, the Marians took over a former Bernardine Church and Monastery in Druja, with an aim to undertake work among the Belorussians. A year later they opened a monastery in Vilani in Latvia for pastoral work in this country. In 1925 the General Curia was moved from Mariampol to Rome where an international college was opened for Marian students. In 1928 the Marians undertook the running of a Mission in the Byzantine- Slav Rite for Russians in Harbin in Manchuria. They set up a religious house there with Archimandrite Fabian Abrantowicz (d. 1946) as its Superior. The foundation and its schools were forcibly closed in 1948. The Marians, present in the monastery at that time were arrested and deported to Soviet labor camps where some of them died a martyr’s death. The others, after regaining freedom, went to other countries where they served in the Eastern Rite in Great Britain, the USA and Australia. In 2003 the beatification process began for the Servants of God, Fabian Abrantowicz and Andrzej Cikota (d. 1952), both Superiors of the Mission, were martyred by the Communist regime. The new Constitutions were approved in 1930 and at the same time, three new provinces were established: The American Povince in the USA, Divine Provi- dence in Poland, and St.George’s in Lithuania. The Congregation then numbered 319 religious in 17 houses. In 1939 the first Marian house was founded in Argentina. At first, the activ- ity concentrated on pastoral care for Lithuanian emigrants. In time, it extended to new pastoral challenges among the Argentinians, like the running of parishes and catholic schools. In 1987, the Argentinian Vicariate of the BVM of Lujan was established under the jurisdiction of the St. Casimir’s Province. In 1940 the Latvian Province of St. Teresa of the Infant Jesus was established. In 1948 a second USA Province of St. Stanisłaus Kostka came into being. The first Province came to be called The Province of St. Casimir. While the Province of St. Casimir’s principal activity was running parishes, publishing and education, the new Province concentrated mainly on the propagation of the message of the Divine Mercy. This led to the establishing of the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy in Stockbridge and the association of the faithful in the framework of the Marian Helpers Association, the Eucharistic Apostles of Divine Mercy and the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception. In 1954 the Monastery in Balsamao was recovered. It was followed by the set- ting up of successive religious houses (Fatima, Lisbon) from which pastoral work