Dear Knights of the Immaculata,

Maria! It is with great joy that I announce to you that the MI National US has found a home in the diocese of Peoria, Illinois! We have been temporarily located in Santa Maria del Popolo Parish in Mundelein, Illinois, for a year and a half while praying and searching for a home with more permanent status. The Peoria site gives the MI a central location in the United States and an established presence of MI members who hopefully will be willing to provide the needed volunteer help in carrying out the MI National mission. This area also happens to be the home diocese of one of the great evangelizing figures of the last century, none other than Servant of God Archbishop Fulton Sheen.

For me, one of the most touching passages in the New Testament is the reaction of St. John to the gift of Mary to himself and the Church. The Gospel of St. John simply says the following: “And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home” (Jn 19:27). Can there be any more perfect description of what the MI National home ought to be than that of Our Lady’s home and her movement’s home?

December 2017

Dear MI Member,

Maria! Greetings to you as we celebrate the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception during this MI Jubilee Year.

In my letter to you last March, I pledged that the National Center would keep our begging to a minimum. We do not intend to saturate you with “junk mail.” Instead—just twice a year—it is better and more appropriately spiritual to beg than to harass.

Additionally, I would like to use these letters to bring you up to date on all the activities of the National Center and MI groups around the country. It has been almost a year since the MI had to leave Marytown. In March I said that I thought, by this move, “Our Lady wants us to soar with wings outspread.” Indeed, that has proven true. She has transformed trials and difficulties into graces and blessings!

A New Home!

We have in fact been mightily blessed: MI-USA is on the verge of acquiring a new, permanent and most extraordinary home! The targeted date is January 8, St. Maximilian’s birthday, an exquisitely suitable date. The Bishop of Peoria has given his blessing to an MI National Center in his diocese. The prayers of so many MI members have been beautifully answered!

It comes complete with meeting rooms, offices, a library, sixteen bedrooms for MI retreatants, and a lovely chapel situated at the heart of the building.

The new center will cost $15,000 per year over a period of 15 years, far less than the market value of the property. Basic overhead—utilities, maintenance and the like—will be about $40,000 per year.

As we celebrate the MI Centennial, this time of rebirth for MI-USA and now of the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ, we look forward with great anticipation to continued renewal in a true national center!

March 25, 2017

Solemnity of the Annunciation
Click Here to download the official letter

Dear MI Member,

Maria! Happy 100 years to you and all of the members of the MI, founded in 1917 by our beloved St. Maximilian!

I hope that you will have local public celebrations of this event, or attend one of the three MI Centenary Celebrations scheduled around the country. We are also sponsoring an MI pilgrimage to Rome in October 2017 to visit special Kolbean sites and to attend the International MI Conference (see insert). Consider being part of this once-in-a-lifetime event!

There are several important developments in recent months to report…

In keeping with the MI General Statutes governing our international Public Association of the Faithful as approved by the Holy See, a new National Council was elected in June 2016. You may have read about that in the newsletter that was mailed to every MI member last summer.

Dear MI Members and Friends of Our Lady: 

As the newly elected President of the MI in the USA, recently I was informed by Fr. John Grigus, Rector of Marytown, that the MI National Council must leave Marytown. He cited finances and the changing mission of Marytown to a broader, more diversified vision of apostolates and ministries. This means Marytown will no longer be the National MI Center. A very large expansion of the National Shrine of St. Maximilian Kolbe at Marytown is being planned, but the plans do not include continuing as the home of the Saint’s great spiritual legacy and gift to the Church, the Militia of the Immaculata.

John Galten
MI National President

Click Here to Read the Full Letter

FROM THE MI NATIONAL PRESIDENT - Nov. 15, 2016

“Begin doing what is necessary, then what is possible. Then suddenly you will find yourself doing the impossible!”
(Attributed to St. Francis of Assisi)

Dear MI Knights of the Immaculata!

Greetings and prayers upon returning from Fatima, where I attended the MI International Congress, which marked the beginning of the 100^th anniversary year observances. I will share my report on this special event in one of the upcoming MI publications.

We look forward with hearts full of gratitude to celebrating the 100th anniversary in 2017 of Our Lady’s appearances at Fatima and the centenary of the MI.

As a starter, I am writing to you today to introduce our new e-publication called:

“The Mission of the Immaculata,”

a monthly newsletter which will hopefully inspire, teach, create solidarity, form and inform.Please feel free to pass it on to others and make sure the MI National office has the email address of every other MI member you know! It’s the least-cost way that we can get news and formation materials to you and your MI friends!

FROM THE MI NATIONAL PRESIDENT

Let us arise and be on our way

Dear MI Members,

It is with great joy that I, John Galten, newly elected National President, and the members of the National MI Council: Michael Wick (Vice President), M. Kathleen O’Brien (Secretary), Antonella Di Piazza (Coordinator) Juliann Elkinton (Council member), and Roy Samson (National Director of MI Youth and Young Adults), introduce ourselves to you and pledge our strongest efforts to prosper the work of the Immaculata. We will shortly be joined by a National Spiritual Assistant (a Franciscan Conventual Friar) and a Treasurer, both of whom are to be appointed. 

The election of this National MI Council was held June 3-5 at Marytown, during the first  National Assembly of the MI in the U.S.A., with over 30 MI representatives present, presided over by the International MI President, Fr. Raffaele Di Muro, OFM Conv. The election results were canonically confirmed by Father Di Muro.

All of us present were deeply surprised and inspired by the spiritual nature of this process in what Father Di Muro called a “historical” moment. The U.S. National MI leadership has been transferred to the hands of a lay board tasked with the Immaculata’s mission to win many souls in the shortest possible time for the Sacred Heart, that He might be all in all. Of course, that will be helped by the prayers and assistance from the Friars, especially at Marytown. 

It is most important to remember that with the advent of the new National leadership that mission of the MI has not changed nor will, in fact, we shall endeavor to advance it. To quote the General  Statutes of the MI (article 8), “The MI was defined by Father Kolbe as ‘a global vision of Catholic life in a new form, consisting in the bond with the Immaculata, our universal Mediatrix with Jesus’ (KW 1220). In fact, the MI aims to promote the extension of the Reign of Christ in the world through the action of the Immaculata, encouraging all Christians to unite themselves to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and to place themselves at her service in the mission that she has as the Mother of the Church.” St. Maximilian not only lived this mission heroically but died a martyr for it. We must resolutely follow in his footsteps and so we shall.