Choosing the first missionaries to go to Canada required the application of discernment on the part of Eugene and his Oblate council
I assure you, my very dear son, that I thought of you only as well motivated in offering yourself to me as one to be chosen to found our first establishment in Canada. I have blessed the Lord for the dispositions in which His grace has put you. Yet I hesitated on remembering the letter you wrote me when I told you that you were assigned as member of the community of Lumières…
After talking about the difficulties that Fr Bermond’s attitude had caused, Eugene continued:
You know that in a far-off mission like that of Canada, one must be equal to any trial. We must be able to count on the solidity of the religious virtues of those who are going to find themselves 1500 leagues from me. Who can foresee the afflictions that one will suffer from men or events if one is not strengthened in the practice of humility and abnegation, if one is not rooted in obedience which is the basis of any religious edifice, if one is not disposed to endure the imperfections of others and especially if one has not so thoroughly renounced his own will that it no longer hurts to submit to that of a superior, which he even does without effort, without sadness, without the least murmur?
Eugene then concluded:
You will not bear me any grudge, my dear son, if I tell you frankly all I think. Give me more reassurance and you will be included in a second contingent.
I embrace and bless you.
Letter to Fr. Francois Bermond, 19 August 1841, EO I n 4
“In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed”
I Peter 1; 6-8
For more details: https://www.omiworld.org/lemma/bermond-francois-xavier/
“…one must be equal to any trial. […] Who can foresee the afflictions that one will suffer from men or events if one is not strengthened in the practice of humility and abnegation, if one is not rooted in obedience which is the basis of any religious edifice, if one is not disposed to endure the imperfections of others and especially if one has not so thoroughly renounced his own will that it no longer hurts to submit to that of a superior, which he even does without effort, without sadness, without the least murmur?”
These words are not empty and as I look I realise that Eugene himself has experienced in his own life all that he speaks to Bermond as being necessary if he is to be a good priest, missionary and member of the congregation.
For some reason this morning the four vows keep presenting themselves from the back of my mind and standing in the forefront, in the light. Although they are not immediately understood as being a part of this conversation they speak to our attitudes and way of being. If all of them together take up residence in our hearts then we will be able to share that as Eugene himself did with Bermond.
We are sent out as missionaries – not on our own mission, but rather on God’s mission. Missio Dei. And no matter our state of life, if we take to heart that which Eugene was saying to Bermond we will, in spite of ourselves, live out the missio Dei.