This week in Christian history: Thomas Coke dies, first Christian school in Montreal, Father Coughlin silenced

By Michael Gryboski, Mainline Church Editor Sunday, April 28, 2024

First Christian school in Montreal founded – April 30, 1658

Marguerite Bourgeoys (1620-1700), a French religious sister who founded the Congrégation de Notre-Dame de Montréal in Quebec and the first school for girls in the colony. | Public Domain

This week marks the anniversary of when Marguerite Bourgeoys launched the first girls’ school in New France, the French colonial holdings that include present-day Montreal.

A native of the Champagne province of France, Bourgeoys opened Montreal’s first school for girls, using a stone stable located at Ville-Marie, near the Hôpital Saint-Joseph, for want of a better facility.

Soon after, Bourgeoys founded the Congrégation de Notre-Dame, reportedly the first Catholic Canadian religious community, which, unlike similar orders, was not cloistered.

“She promised her nuns nothing but ‘bread and soup,’ a prospect that scarcely invited entry into her community. Yet at her death in 1700 there were 40 sisters to continue her work,” explained the Dictionary of Canadian Biography.

“By 1961 the community numbered 6,644 nuns. In that year, in 262 establishments in Canada, the United States, and Japan, the Congrégation de Notre-Dame reached nearly 100,000 pupils through its teaching, a diffusion of the gospel which prolongs in time and space the presence of Marguerite Bourgeoys.”