"A Marist? And what do you do?" is the first thing people ask…or perhaps they just say: "Oh Yes, you are a teaching order, of course." Embarrassing, because really we would not want to define ourselves by any one apostolate. In fact, being a Marist has as much to do with an outlook and a way of doing things as with pastoral activity. Marists are more similar to a movement in the church, rather than a single religious order.

As Marists we take Mary the mother of Jesus as our model. To be a Marist is to be called and chosen, through a love freely bestowed on us, to live the Gospel as Mary did, in a Society, which bears her name. It was Mary who brought into the world God's own son. She was the first to welcome the good news of the Father's love, and to discern the Son's mission as servant among his people, sharing his poverty and his total gift of self to the Father.

It is from Mary that we learn to serve the Church in a special way.

"Since their vocation is to be in today's world a special presence of Mary, doing God's work in her way, Marists bear in mind this woman who by a gracious choice called them and gave them her name". (Marist Fathers' Constitutions, 144).

There are four Marist religious congregations with about ten thousand members between them, as well as lay people who dedicate themselves as Marists. These five branches constitute the Marist Family.