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Claretians

Community of Catholic priests

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 7, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

The Claretians, officially named the Congregation of Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is a Catholic clerical religious congregation of Pontifical Right for men headquartered in Rome. It was founded on July 16, 1849, by Fr. Antonio María Claret y Clará, C.M.F. They are active as missionaries worldwide, in 70 countries on five continents. The number of Claretian priests and brothers is at more than 3,000. The Congregation has a particular devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and members have published extensively in Mariology.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Claretians” is community of Catholic priests. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Claretians, Community and Catholic, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1849—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Claretians, Community and Catholic is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “community of Catholic priests” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 7, 2026. The first chronological checks are 1849.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Claretians”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Claretians primary sources, Claretians archive and Claretians research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Claretians”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Claretians” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.