The Brothers of the Sacred Heart are a Catholic religious congregation founded in 1821 by the Reverend André Coindre (1787-1826). Its Constitutions were modeled upon those of the Jesuits, while its Rule of Life was based upon the Rule of Saint Augustine. Its members bind themselves for life by simple vows of religion. There are only a few priests in the Congregation, the vast majority of its membe
rs being lay Brothers, who live in community in accordance with the Congregation's Rule of Life. Foundations: André Coindre was a survivor of the chaos created in French society by the Reign of Terror at the end of the French Revolution. Though only a child at the time, out of this experience, he became committed to providing the moral, intellectual and religious development of the many boys left orphaned by the upheavals of this era. As a young man, Coindre entered the seminary of the Diocese of Lyon, France. and eventually was ordained as a secular priest of the diocese. During his period of preparation for his ministry, he came to envision men and women trained to work with the poor through education. The first steps toward a concrete expression of this vision took place with his participation in the foundation in 1815 of the Religious of Jesus and Mary by St. Claudine Thévenet, the daughter of a merchant in the silk trade, for which Lyon had become noted. Like Coindre, Thévenet had survived the horrors of the late Revolutionary period. She was not left unscathed, as she had to watch both her brothers being brutally murdered during that period. Under the guidance of Abbé Coindre, whom she had taken as her spiritual director, she gathered friends around her to offer shelter and basic education for poor girls, whom she considered the "weakest, the most shameful, the most deprived" of post-Revolutionary French society. As foundress of her Congregation, she became known as Mother Mary St. Cor Jesu College: Founded and administered by the Brothers of the Sacred Heart, its roots trace back to June 1959, when Father Maurice Leveille, P.M.E. parish priest of Digos and on invitation of the late Bishop Clovis Thibault, P.M.E., three brothers of the Sacred Heart, Bro. Jean Paul "Elric" Beaudet, S.C., Bro. Conrad [Clement] Tranchemontagne, S.C., and Bro. Guillaume McCabe, S.C. took over the management of the 220 boys of the Holy Cross Academy of Digos under the administration of the Religious of the Virgin Mary Sisters (RVM).
