Lac-Etchemin, terre mariale

LAC-ETCHEMIN
Marian Land

Ninety-six kilometers or 60 miles south-east of Quebec City, in the charming landscapes of the Appalachian mountains, there rises the municipality of Sainte-Germaine-du-Lac-Etchemin. This latter surrounds the town of Lac-Etchemin located on the north shore of the lake after which the town was named, a wonderful stretch of water 4.3 km (2.7 miles) in length, an oasis of coolness giving the region a special character.

The parish of Sainte-Germaine-du-Lac-Etchemin goes back to 1867 when it was set up as a mission by the Archbishop of Quebec, Archbishop Baillargeon who gave it as a patron saint a humble shepherd girl canonized that same year, Saint Germaine Cousin (1579-1601). In 1869, the mission was established canonically as a parish, and in 1874, it became a municipality. The village withdrew from the municipality in 1959, to form its own municipality which, in 1966, was granted the status of town, the town of Lac-Etchemin.

During the 1940s, when tuberculosis flourished in Quebec claiming numerous victims among the population, the Honorable Joseph-D. Bégin, Minister of Colonial Development, put before the government of the time the attributes of Lac-Etchemin as being an excellent site for the construction of a sanatorium. So, in April 1946, work began on this imposing hospital building with a capacity of 250 beds, which overlooks the town and was named the Begin Sanatorium. It was officially inaugurated on September 18, 1948, at which time there was also the solemn ceremony of blessing presided over by His Excellency Archbishop Maurice Roy.

At the beginning of May 1952, Father Adrien Ouellet, originally from Lac-Etchemin and a priest in the Diocese of Quebec, obtained, with the support of Msgr. Hilaire Chouinard, parish priest at Saint-Germaine, the authorization to found on the wooded shores of Etchemin Lake a shrine dedicated to the Virgin Mary under the name of Our Lady of Etchemin. The first Mass was celebrated in the shrine on the following September 8, on the feast of the Nativity of Mary. Many members of the assembly, piously recollected, crowded in within those blessed walls, in order to participate in the Eucharistic and Marian celebration which marked the beginning of pilgrimages. Since then, there has been a regular flow of pilgrims to this place dedicated to the Immaculate Virgin who, long ago, had cast her eyes upon this humble corner of New France where Marian devotion brings souls together before the Eucharist.

Thus, for forty years, she secretly prepared the way for her maternal plans by forming, through the cross, the instrument she had chosen for herself to transmit her orders here below and found her Army one day. This instrument is Marie-Paule, originally of Lac-Etchemin, born on September 14, 1921, on the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross.

On August 28, 1971, in the evening of a Marian day, in which a Marian Group of approximately seventy-five people from several regions of Quebec and the United States had come to the Shrine of Our Lady of Etchemin, Marie-Paule “learned” from On-High that the Army of Mary (which had been “announced” to her in 1954) had been founded on that day. She also learned that “THIS ARMY WOULD BE RECOGNIZED BY THIS SINGLE TRAIT: ITS FIDELITY TO ROME AND TO THE POPE.”

From then on, the little ARMY began its “march of conquest” for the Immaculate, establishing itself in different dioceses of Quebec, Canada, the United States and Europe. Important pilgrimages led it to visit the main shrines of Europe and the Holy Land. Soon, it would be members from other countries who would come on pilgrimage to Quebec, visiting the cradle of the Work which now has its international Center at the Spiri-Maria Center in Lac-Etchemin close to the little Shrine where the Work was founded.

Spiri-Maria is a Eucharistic and Marian Center which came into being during the Great Jubilee Year 2000. It is both a place of perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, a retreat house, and the Center from which radiates internationally the Community of the Lady of All Peoples which encompasses the five Works founded by Marie-Paule or Mother Paul-Marie (her name in religion).

- the Army of Mary (whose goal is personal interior reform);
- the Family of the Sons and Daughters of Mary (for the renewal of the family);
- the Community of the Sons and Daughters of Mary (for the renewal of priests and religious);
- the Oblate-Patriots (for a political government in accord with the Church’s social doctrine);
- the Marialys Institute (for young people and the bringing together of priests faithful to Rome).

“The Lady of All Peoples,” that is how the Virgin Mary presented herself to Ida Peerdeman in Holland where she entrusted to her messenger, between 1945 and 1959, a message for the world which she had come to unite into “one single community of peoples”, having received from God “the power to drive out Satan” in order to prepare the terrestrial Kingdom we ask for every day when we pray the “Our Father”: “thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven”.

“She is the handmaid,” the Lady of All Peoples said one day to Ida Peerdeman as she designated Marie-Paule. Yes, a humble handmaid, if there ever was one, whose mission it is to give Christ back to this poor world which has lost the sense of God and which has been wallowing for so long under Satan’s yoke, the source of so much corruption, disaster and war.

“MAJOR VIRTUS QUAM” (more virtue than brilliance) is the motto of the municipality of Sainte-Germaine-du-Lac-Etchemin, found on its coat of arms. God draws His greatest masterpieces from littleness, as this blessed corner of heaven reminds us!