Father Courtès in Aix en Provence was very generous in taking on priestly ministerial commitments for himself and the community in the city. Eugene reminds him to focus on why the Oblates were founded in that city
All these occasion sermons mean nothing. That is not your ministry. You are instituted for missions and retreats. You must aim only at converting souls and not at pleasing the public, not even the Parish Priests…
He then compares us with the Jesuits and their successful city ministry:
If we had four centuries of existence behind us. we could. I hope, compete with the Jesuits, not only in zeal but in moral power and successful means. That is too much of an ambition for the time of our infancy. I bless God for the good they are doing, and I am resigned to the fact that we do much less than they in the big cities where they have plenty of distinguished men.
Let us learn to appreciate the part the Lord has assigned to us. In a mission, don’t we do a hundred thousand times more good than they? Each has his task to do. Let them preach in the cities, we shall continue to convert entire populations in the villages. towns and countryside.
To prove his point, Eugene tells him about a letter from some Oblates currently involved in preaching a village mission:
I received a letter from Father Bernard. The mission is filled with the greatest hopes. I am sure of the most complete success. This is our real compensation. We have to count only on God, and then he will deal with us as in the manner of a generous master.
Letter to Hippolyte Courtès, 8 January 1841, EO IX n 722
How ambitious and generous we want to be in our service of others at times! Let us ask God to help us to do our “little part” to the best of our abilities today.
“Let us learn to appreciate the part the Lord has assigned to us.” Eugene always able to get at the heart of the matter as he calls his sons back to where God has called them to be. Once again he describes the very things that I struggle with over and over again. He calls me back; not to be the biggest and the best, but to be a “part of”… How unhappy I will be if I try to be anything more than human, or believe that there really are those who are less than human. I, we, are sent to bring the Good News to the poor.
There is a balance which Eugene reminds us of that this morning. I think of Eugene’s Lenten Homily in the Church of the Madeleine; he shared his message with those who were often judged to be less than human. And I am reminded of his words from The Preface: “We must lead mankind to act like human beings, first of all…” Human is a good thing to be, especially in the light of how many of us, at one time or another, may have felt less than human.
I think of the apostles, the disciples of Jesus who spoke and taught about the Lord – it was not about raising themselves up but how God calls us to something greater than ourselves. Paul was especially adept at that. “… like Christians”.
No matter the times, be they 2000 years ago, 200 years ago or in the present day, our present world does not seem to have changed all that greatly from the time of Jesus, or Eugene; we continue to struggle in this way of being human. It is God who hands out the assignments; it is our Beloved who calls us to be in a most particular way – the way that will bring us home to him.
Frank reminds us to “Let us ask God to help us do our ‘little part’ to the best of our abilities…”
“…we must help them to become saints.” It is all about us, how we have been called – it is no longer I, as St. Paul told us, but God in me. A self-imposed weight is lifted from our shoulders as we step forward in joy to receive the part that our crucified Saviour has called us to share with him…