WHO WE ARE
Voluntas Dei Institute is a Roman Catholic secular institute that gathers clergy, singles, and married couples to live a life in Christ.
A secular institute is a form of consecrated life within the Roman Catholic Church. Its members—both laypeople and ordained ministers—live and serve in the wider world, rather than in a religious community. United by a shared spirituality and way of life, they commit themselves to God and to the institute through a sacred bond recognized by the Church under Canon Law (1983 Code of Canon Law, Canons 710–730).
OUR MISSION
is to actively, communally, and prayerfully discern the will of God in our lives while living the sacrament of the present moment.
WE SEEK TO…
discern and carry out the will of God
live as instruments of Christ, modeled after Mary at the Annunciation
serve within ordinary life, work, and relationships
bring Christ’s presence wherever they are called
help build peace, fellowship, and the Kingdom of God
OUR HISTORY
Fr. Louis-Marie Parent, O.M.I., founder, celebrating Mass. July 4, 1958.
On July 2, 1958, Father Louis-Marie Parent gathered his first recruits in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, and founded the Voluntas Dei Institute. His purpose was clear: to raise up Christians ready to share in his apostolic mission and live the Gospel in real service to the Church. He envisioned a form of Christian commitment that would draw people irresistibly closer to God — so they could celebrate, together, the joyful hope of salvation in Jesus Christ.
Seven years later, on Pentecost Sunday, June 6, 1965, the Church recognized Voluntas Dei as a Secular Institute of Pontifical Rite.
Founding of the Voluntas Dei Institute:
July 2, 1958, Trois-Rivières, Québec, Canada. Fr. Louis-Marie Parent, O.M.I., with the Institute’s first members at the Chapel of Our Lady of La Salette.
What Is a Secular Institute?
The Church had opened the door to this form of consecrated life only a decade earlier. On February 2, 1947, Pope Pius XII's Apostolic Constitution Provida Mater Ecclesia recognized Secular Institutes as a new form of consecration in the Church. The vision was simple but bold: members would live their total consecration to God fully immersed in the world — "as leaven in the dough" — bringing others to encounter the God of all happiness through their joy and energy. In the years that followed, the Church officially sanctioned numerous secular institutes for men and women, and Voluntas Dei took its place among them.
Our Founder: Father Louis-Marie Parent, OMI
Father Parent was a man of unshakable faith in Divine Providence, a tireless apostle of the Gospel, a man of prayer, and a sought-after preacher. In life and in death, he was recognized for his extraordinary holiness and for the gifts he poured, without rest, into the service of the Church. Born in Quebec, Canada, in 1910, he joined the Oblates of Mary Immaculate in 1931 and was ordained a priest in 1937. A year later, he answered the call to missionary life in Northern Alberta.
His founding work began early. In 1943, with two women from Montreal, he helped establish The Missionary Recluses, a contemplative religious community. He went on to serve as parish priest in Falher, Alberta (1944), and as a colonizer missionary in Peace River, Alberta (1945). In 1952, he founded the Oblate Missionaries of Mary Immaculate, a secular institute for women. Six years later, in 1958, he founded the Voluntas Dei Institute for clergy and laypeople.
Father Parent died on May 17, 2009, at the age of 98 — leaving behind a legacy of faith that continues through the Institute he founded.
Pius XII in St. Peter’s Square, 1947
Father Léo Deschâtelets, O.M.I. (seated) signing documentation founding the Voluntas Dei Institute; July 1958.