The Unity Fathers are 50 years old

NEXT Friday (Oct. 30) marks the 50th anniversary of the reception of the Society of the Atonement into the Catholic Church.
It was in the little convent chapel of Our Lady of the Angels at Graymoor, New York, in 1909, that Fr. Paul James Francis, S.A., and 16 followers (two friars, five sisters, and ten lay people) were received, being permitted by Pope St. Pius X to keep their name and religious habit and continue their work for Unity.
GRAYMOOR
Before going to Graymoor in 1899, Fr. Paul had served as an Episcopalian pastor. He met Lurana Mary White, later Mother Lurana, S.A., at Warwick, New York, in 1898, and together they resolved to found the Society of the Atonement. For ten years, Fr. Paid and his small group advocated the return of nonCatholics to the Holy See. Their message was not popular in Protestant circles. But the Apostolic Delegate, Mgr. FaIconic, OEM., conveyed reports in favour of the society to Rome, and Cardinal Merry dcl Val pleaded with St. Pius X to "let them into the Church".
St. Pius replied, fittingly, on the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary or Our Lady of Victory (Oct. 7), and plans were quickly made for the reception. To Fr. Paul this meant a "homecoming". After the reception he said, "I feel as though we have been embraced by a great ocean of love". He was ordained to the Catholic priesthood on June 16, 1910. He died in 1940.
That the work for Unity which he inaugurated has blossomed, is shown by the number of houses which the Society of the Atonement now has in various parts of the world: England (where they have recently taken charge of the Catholic Central Library), Ireland, Canada, Japan, Rome and Assisi. Nearly 400 sisters and some 300 friars are now working with the society.