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The Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles is a traditional monastic community of women who desire to imitate the Blessed Virgin Mary in the giving of herself to God to fulfill His Will, especially in her role of assistance by prayer and work to the Apostles, first priests of the Catholic Church.
Society in these latter days is in obvious dire need of re-evangelization and sanctification through the ministry in particular of the sacred priesthood of the Roman Catholic Church. Although times have changed, the divine mission committed to the first Apostles, as well as the needs of those to whom they were sent, have not.
It is our ideal to imitate Our Lady's retirement from the world in quiet seclusion, as well as her apostolic charity. Consecrated entirely to her and filled with her spirit, which is none other than the Holy Spirit of God, we aspire to be, to the successors of the Apostles in our times, what she was to them in the beginning: behind-the-scenes encouragement, assistance and support.
We have made a new chapter to our story. This March 2006 we moved from our mother diocese in Scranton, Pennsylvania, to that of Kansas City-St. Joseph in Missouri. With the blessing of our former bishop to transfer, we accepted the welcoming invitation of Most Rev. Robert W. Finn D.D.. Our new bishop has offered firm support and protection of our charism and liturgy, and has approved and encouraged our canonical advancement by erecting our Priory as an official novitiate in keeping with Church's canons.
The Bishop has provided a temporary home for us to live in and we have already been offered several donations of land. Hopefully we will be erecting our permanent monastery building soon. We are really looking forward to completion of our future building plans and feel very blessed to be here in the midwest.
Concerning our name change... When we first decided on our choice of name, after having gathered as a community eleven years ago, it had been our desire one day be called “Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles”. We felt we needed to prove ourselves first before being so bold as to call ourselves Benedictine. The purpose of the name “Oblates” was two-fold: first, to indicate that we offered ourselves to the Benedictine family (Oblatae is Latin for offered) and also because we had consecrated ourselves to Our Lady, and offered ourselves to her service.
We continue to pray for and express our gratitude towards all our benefactors and friends in Christ.
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