CICM Missionaries

The congregation was founded by Théophile Verbist, who was a diocesan priest in the Archdiocese of Mechelen-Brussels in the mid-19th century. He served as chaplain to the military academy in Brussels and at the same time as a national director of the Pontifical Association of the Holy Childhood. He would lead a group of other Belgian diocesan priests, who became deeply concerned with the abandoned children in China and with the millions in China which, at the time, suffered from widespread poverty. The congregation is named after a religious Marian devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and has sought to expand its missionary work in various countries abroad.

File:7 1 Rutjes met paters.jpg, {{circa|1885}}]]

With the Convention of Peking occurring, the CICM would begin establishing operations in the country in the early 1860s.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} In 1862, Verbist founded the Belgian Mission in China. Upon seeking ecclesiastical permission, however, they were commissioned by Cardinal Alessandro Barnabò to begin their work by founding a seminary in Belgium to supply priests for the beginning mission, laying the foundations of the Scheutveld College, 28 April 1863, in the Field of Scheut near Brussels. As a result, the C.I.C.M. missionaries were also known as Scheutists or Scheut missionaries.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

In September 1863, the first group of missionaries set forth for Inner Mongolia.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} In the winter of 1865, Verbist and his four companions arrived in inner Mongolia, which was entrusted to the fledgling congregation by Rome, and immediately began organizing small Christian communities. Three years later, on 23 February 1868, Verbist died of typhoid fever at the age of 44 in Lao-Hu-Kou.

The Scheutveld priests and brothers would face dangers such as the Boxer Rebellion in China, the climate of the nations in which missions were conducted, and persecution of the missionaries and their local congregations.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

After World War I, Belgium lay devastated, leading the Missionary Fathers of Scheut to establish a center in a safe location from which they could send out their missionaries.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} As many Belgian refugees at that time were living in London, it was thought that a church in that city would serve the spiritual needs of the Belgian community of London and also become a base for the Order's missionary activities. In 1922, the Church of Our Lady of Hal was established in a hut on Arlington Road in Camden Town while a permanent church was built opposite this site in 1933.[https://parish.rcdow.org.uk/camdentown/about-the-parish/ About the parish - Website of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Westminster][https://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/scheut-fathers Plaque to the Scheut Fathers - London Remembers website]

During World War II, Father Jozef Raskin, who was a missionary to Inner Mongolia from 1920 to 1934, was made a chaplain in the Belgian army and was a personal advisor to King Leopold III.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} While he was operating under the code name Leopold Vindictive 200 for the Dutch resistance in 1942, he was captured by the Gestapo and sentenced to death by beheading on 18 October 1943.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

File:Missiehuis van Scheut - Bâtiment.jpg, Brussels]]

The congregation would grow in the following years, eventually growing to have a worldwide presence.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} Originally a Belgian Foundation, CICM has grown into an international religious missionary congregation of men from different races, colors and nationalities.

In connection with their missions, the Fathers opened a number of institutions, such the hospital at St-Trudon, Upper Kassai, for those afflicted with sleeping sickness.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

Today, 780 CICM priests and lay brothers are present in Asian countries (e.g. Mongolia, Indonesia, and Japan), Africa, the Americas, and in Europe.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

{{Globalize section|date=September 2023|the Philippines}}

:*Saint Louis University, Baguio

:*Saint Louis College, San Fernando, La Union

:*University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao, Tuguegarao, Cagayan Valley

:*Saint Mary's University, Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya

:*Saint Louis College – Cebu, Mandaue, Cebu

:*Maryhurst Seminary, Baguio

:*Maryhill School of Theology, Quezon City

:*Maryshore Seminary, Bacolod

:*Saint Vincent's School, Bontoc, Mountain Province

:*Santo Rosario School, Pudtol, Apayao

File:Scheut portrettengalerij.jpg|A gallery of all CICM missionaries at the Scheut House in Anderlecht, Brussels

File:Relief of Fr. Jules Sepulchre in the Philippines.jpg|A Relief of Fr. Jules Sepulchre, CICM, in Bontoc, Mountain Province, Philippines. He is one of the founding Missionaries in the Northern Philippines.

File:Plate under the Relief of Fr. Jules Sepulchre.jpg|The plate under the relief of Fr. Jules Sepulchre, CICM in Bontoc, Mountain Province, Philippines

{{Reflist}}

{{Commons category}}

• Raskin, Albert (1977) 'The archives of the Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (C.I.C.M.)', History in Africa, 4, 299–304.
• Berg, Leo van den (1994) 'The China world of the "Scheut fathers"', Bulletin de l 'Institut Historique de Belge de Rome, 64, 223–263.

• {{cite book|last1=Verhelst|first1=Daniël|last2=Pycke|first2=Nestor|title=C.I.C.M. Missionaries Past and Present: History of the Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Scheut/Missionhurst)|series=Verbistiana|volume=4|location=Leuven|publisher=Leuven University Press|year=1995|isbn=978-9-06186-676-3}}
• {{cite book|last1=Vanysacker|first1=Dries|last2=Renson|first2=Raymond|title=The Archives of the Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (CICM-Scheut) (1862–1967) - 2 v.|location=Rome|publisher=Bibliothèque de l'Institut Historique Belge de Rome|year=1995|isbn=978-9-07446-115-3}}

• [http://www.odis.be/lnk/en/OR_10258 CICM Missionaries] in [https://www.odis.eu ODIS - Online Database for Intermediary Structures] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160428134547/https://www.odis.eu/ |date=2016-04-28 }}
• [http://www.odis.be/lnk/en/AE_2560 Archives of the CICM Missionaries] in [https://www.odis.eu ODIS - Online Database for Intermediary Structures] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160428134547/https://www.odis.eu/ |date=2016-04-28 }}

{{Catholic Church in Belgium}}

{{Navbox with columns

|name = CICM Philippines

|title = {{color|white|CICM System of Schools in the}} Philippines

|titlestyle = color:white;background:blue;

| colheaderstyle = vertical-align: top; width:14.28%; padding-top: 0.6em; padding-bottom: 0.6em; background:#0260A8; color:#FFFFFF;

| col1header = {{color|white|Saint Louis
College of Cebu}} {{color|white|Mandaue City, Cebu}}

| col2header = {{color|white|Saint Louis
College}} {{color|white|San Fernando City,
La Union}}

| col3header = Saint Louis University (Baguio) Baguio

| col4header = Saint Mary's University (Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya) {{color|white|Bayombong,
Nueva Vizcaya}}

| col5header = {{color|white|University of
Saint Louis}} {{color|white|Tuguegarao,
Cagayan}}

| col6header = {{color|white|Maryhill School of
Theology}} {{color|white|Quezon City}}

| col7header = {{color|white|Maryhurst
Seminary}} {{color|white|Baguio}}

| col8header = {{color|white|Maryshore
Seminary}} {{color|white|Bacolod City}}

}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Catholic Church in Belgium

Category:Religious organizations established in 1862

Category:Catholic missionary orders

Category:Roman Catholic missionaries in China

Category:Catholic religious institutes established in the 19th century

Category:1862 establishments in Belgium