Very soon after the arrival of the new community of Oblates in Nimes, Eugene wrote them a letter full of advice. It gives the impression of a an anxious parent standing by as he watches a child taking his first steps. These extracts give us an insight into the relations between Eugene and his Oblates.
I would wish, my very dear friends, to reply to each of you in particular but the spirit of poverty opposes this. You will all receive therefore from the same sheet of paper the expression of the sentiments I nourish in my heart for brothers such as yourselves.
I have learnt with great consolation of your arrival at Nimes. Your beginnings cause me to predict that this new-born establishment will go well. Fortified with good intentions, you must before all else win the esteem and affection of those who can support or protect your zeal…
It would be as well to send a joint letter as soon as possible to the Bishop, that Father Mie should write in the name of all to tell him that having been summoned on his orders to his diocese, your first care is to place yourselves under his protection and to ask his benediction; you will formulate some well-turned phrases to let him know your devotedness and obedience…
I recommend to our excellent Father Honorat much moderation. He must make every day, towards the end of the oraison, some reflections on this subject. The least imprudence would cause much harm in this time of beginning, and all the more so because the Bishop fears nothing so much as that.
… Well fancy our dear Brother Guibert wishing to find books while there is still not a bed or a cooking pot! I recognize him well on that score.
Letter to Fathers Mie, Honorat and to Brother Guibert, 2 June 1825, EO VI n.180
‘It is easier for a father to have children than for children to have a real father.” Pope John XXIII
What a wonderful place to be this morning! With Eugene as he speaks with his sons. Very much the father; one can almost imagine the look on his face as he thinks of each of the men as he writes to them. And as the letter was read, the shared laughter and groans, the comments perhaps along the line of ‘yes I must write that letter’, the shared laughter as Guibert looked at his book. A father who knew his sons, his children- their weaknesses and their strengths- loving totally as they were, as they had been created. No need for them to be other than they were even as he called each of them to more.
I think perhaps this is what family is all about, what community is all about. It is what the leaders in the Old Testament spoke to and how Jesus himself talked with his disciples. I think of myself and how I hold myself as a child of God. In my life my dad was not able to be a father to me and so for me it took a long time before I could allow myself to say God the Father let alone be the ‘Father’ to me. It took me a long time to allow myself to be a child, a daughter, to allow myself to be loved for who I am, not what I do. And I find myself sometimes loving others in the same manner, as a parent, as a mother.
I have come here this week, come home to my sister’s – so that I can ‘let go’ of that life-grabbing habit of doing in order to belong and be okay. It began here and it is here, in the safety of family love that I will say goodbye to a part of me that is no longer needed. I offer here what was the message of one of my sister’s retirement cards that she received last week – because it seem to to express where we are all at – back 200 years ago and today. I find in it myself, my sister, Eugene and so many others I know.
“Blessed be the one who offers herself as a beacon for others to follow. May her footsteps imprint wisdom in the hearts of those who would otherwise have no eyes to see. May she be strong and fearless against the tyrannies she faces. And, may her message be one offeredwith tendernessand compassionfor the gentle souls that follow her.”