The Maronite Church takes its name from an important monastery, Saint Maron, which was named in honor of an ascetic named Maron (Maroûn). This saint had lived in the north of Syria and had withdrawn to a mountain to lead a life of prayer and penance, like all the other Syrian monks.

Unfortunately, we have very little information about the life and activities of this hermit. The only account that provides some details comes from Theodoret, the bishop of Cyrrhus (in Syria). This great historian does not provide the birth or death dates of Saint Maron. However, thanks to him, we know that the monk Maron was born in the 4th century. Having renounced the world, he led an ascetic life of the strictest austerity in his hermitage, often in the open air. His reputation attracted disciples around him, who, eager for Christian perfection, sought a model and an experienced spiritual guide. These disciples joined his school, sharing his solitude and discipline. After his death around 410, his body became the subject of disputes among the inhabitants of various cities in the region. Each city wanted to possess the body of this holy hermit. In the end, the inhabitants of the largest and strongest town succeeded in taking possession of the body and placed it in a temple built specifically in his memory. This sanctuary quickly became a place of pilgrimage. In the year 452, Emperor Marcian ordered the construction of a large monastery near Apamea, the capital of Second Syria, for the disciples of this saint. This Saint Maron Monastery is the birthplace of the Maronite Church.

The importance of this convent grew more and more. The faithful from the surrounding areas came under the authority of this monastery and shared the life of its monks. In the 8th century, following the Arab invasion, when the see of Antioch became vacant, the powerful Saint Maron Monastery, which had jurisdiction over the population around the convent, declared its independence and formed a true Church, at the head of which was a patriarch.

Established as a patriarchate and consistently faithful to the true doctrine of the Christian faith, the Maronite Church continued to suffer the most violent persecutions from heretics and Arabs. Faced with the choice of enduring these persecutions or changing their beliefs, the Maronites chose to emigrate to Lebanon, which became their place of refuge and the center of their community. However, in Lebanon, as in the Orontes Valley, the Maronite community preserved, over the centuries, its original monastic character, so that the patriarch, bishops, and even priests and the faithful, continued to share the life of their monks.

At that time, the Byzantine Empire was divided into Prefectures, which were further divided into provinces. Lebanon (or Phoenicia), along with Syria and Palestine, were provinces of the diocese of Antioch in the Prefecture of the East. This is why the Maronite patriarch is, even to this day, the patriarch of Antioch and all the East. The liturgical language of the Maronite Church has remained Syriac or Aramaic, the language that Christ spoke when He became man.

Subsequently, the Maronite Church quickly established itself as a nation, so that the patriarch became both its spiritual and temporal leader. In this way, the Maronites were able to preserve themselves in a theocratic East, and, most importantly, they were able to help other separated Christian communities rebuild their new Churches, which had once again become Catholic.

In short, Sister Rafqa of Himlaya is the daughter of this nation, which forms the only Church in the East that has remained always faithful to the Apostolic See. There have never been Orthodox Maronites; all have been and are Catholics, and the role they played in preserving Catholicism in the East has been greatly appreciated by the Holy Pontiffs. If the Maronites are indeed the faithful heirs of a tradition of holiness and Catholic unity that they defended at the cost of their blood, Sister Rafqa is one of its most faithful heirs.