On the 20th of March 2025, we were thrilled in Trois-Rivières, Canada to witness the major event of the sale of our “Kermaria” property, a symbol of the flowering of the Congregation in Canada.
In search of a ‘home’ and places of mission
The first Daughters of Jesus to arrive in Canada came from France, having been driven out of their small country schools in Brittany as a result of a recurring movement of political upheaval following the French revolution. Some 200 of our French Sisters emigrated to Canada, looking for a place to survive, to be welcomed and to serve, like many immigrants and poor people today.
In 1902 and 1903, through a series of events and encounters, Providence led our two foundresses, Mother Ste Elizabeth and Mother St Zenaïde, on an incredible pilgrimage from
New York to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in the Acadian villages of Eastern Canada; in Quebec, in Trois-Rivières and throughout the Mauricie region as well as Rimouski, Bas du Fleuve and Gaspésie; also, in Alberta, Western Canada and in the United States, in Montana, which borders with Alberta.
A hospitable people
Everywhere, the people who welcomed our Sisters were poor, but rich in heart and humanity. They quickly adopted our Sisters, who were in a very precarious situation, as their own.
In Trois-Rivières, Monsignor Cloutier, the bishop of the diocese, gave them the Manor of Tonnancour, a former colonial manor house. This served as their first pied-a-terre in Canada, the novitiate and, from the very beginning, our first educational project: a kindergarten. He also entrusted them with several rural schools in his diocese.
Over the years, the foundations quickly multiplied in marginalized regions across the country. Our Sisters and novices who had crossed the Atlantic showed invincible courage as they developed rural schools, domestic services in bishoprics and seminaries, educational and social works, health centres and hospitals, nursing schools, community services and humble beginnings in native Indian communities. Numerous vocations to the Daughters of Jesus quickly followed, rooted in the faith and in the hearts of simple, vulnerable people who carried the missionary flame.
The Old Manor becomes too small
In 1923, twenty years after the first foundations, we acquired the property of Turcotte House on the Boulevard St-Louis in Trois-Rivières. This became the provincial house and novitiate for all our communities in Canada and gave birth to our present-day “Kermaria”. Its name, which means “Village of Mary” in Breton, has always kept us in communion with the origins of the Congregation. The house gradually grew and was transformed.
The chapel of St Joseph of Kermaria was built in 1934, the year of the Congregation’s centenary. As a true religious and architectural heritage, it has accompanied all our personal and community journeys and bears witness to the breath of love that has always kept alive the flame of our vocation and mission. Although it was deconsecrated on the 8th of October 2024, it will be preserved intact during the transformation of the building.
Great passages
Over the years, the acceleration of the changes at every level of society and the Church, has called us to anticipate, discern and assume major transitions together. It was thus that the Daughters of Jesus left Kermaria in 2019 to join the Ursuline and Carmelite Sisters and lay people, at the Lokia Residence for the elderly.
Today, the sale/legacy of our house and property in Kermaria, signed on the 20th of March
2025, is very much part of our vocation and mission. Deeply affected by the current lodging crisis in Trois-Rivières and the Mauricie region, we are pleased to contribute to the creation of affordable housing for our brothers and sisters in very precarious situations through the non-profit organisation, ‘Popular Homes Québec – Access to Lodging Trois-Rivières’. We see this de-appropriation as a gesture of reciprocity and gratitude towards those who so generously welcomed us in our own moments of precariousness and distress.
Press conference in Kermaria, 21st of March 2025
1st row: Daughters of Jesus team responsible for the Kermaria sales project:
Monique Brûlé, Micheline Cormier, Régional, Louise Doucet, Gisèle Lacerte.
2nd row : Jean-François Corbeil, developper of the 140-unit projet ; Jean
Branchaud, President of Accès-Logement Trois-Rivières; Ghislain Aubin, President of Habitations populaires and Jean Lamarche, Mayor of Trois-Rivières.
The transformation of “Kermaria” into “Kermaria Residences” will be carried out in two stages. 69 low-cost housing units will first be built inside the building itself, then 140 affordable homes will be constructed on another part of the property.
A range of services
A vision of a range of other services accompanies the sale of Kermaria. In fact, other projects are already underway on what was our Kermaria property. Since 2019, “Albatross House” has occupied the space of what was our infirmary to care for patients at the end of their lives. “Maison Re-né” is dedicated to people with HIV or in need of detoxification. Another house in what had been the chaplaincy, initially housed abused women, offering them refuge and support. Now known as “The Ferry”, it welcomes people suffering from mental health problems and in need of help. A longer-term perspective for Popular Homes is the creation of an appropriate space for residents suffering from cognitive loss.
Renaissance
Could we not see this perspective of fraternal reciprocity in the transformation of Kermaria,
“Village of Mary” and “House of charity”, at the service of the most vulnerable members of the population, as a source of profoundly humanising values on both sides and a light of hope? Our hearts are filled with deep joy as we begin this new chapter in our history as Daughters of Jesus in North America. We believe that the transmission of our human, spiritual and charismatic heritage, with roots going back 123 years in our Canada Region, will be carried out in the manner of God, who is always present at the heart of the ‘slow germination’ of the seeds cast into the earth.
S. Micheline Cormier, fj, Regional
Trois Rivières, Canada
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