MAY THE MOST HOLY AND IMMACULATE VIRGIN MARY, OUR LOVING MOTHER, KEEP YOU ALWAYS UNDER HER PROTECTION.

Posted on August 22, 2022 by franksantucci

“As sailors are guided into port by the shining of a star, so Christians are guided to heaven by Mary” (Saint Thomas Aquinas)

As Superior General, whenever Eugene sent Oblates to the missions outside of France, he entrusted them to Mary Immaculate’s care. Here are just two examples.

When he sent Father Semeria and the first community to Ceylon:

Now go forward, beloved Son, to the work that is entrusted to you together with those whom we have chosen to be your companions in those distant parts of Asia, for the greater glory of God, which we must further there and everywhere.

May the Most Holy and Immaculate Virgin Mary, our loving Mother, keep you always under her protection. May the angels of God assist you. And as for Us, beloved son in Christ, we will not cease to implore for you an abundant rain of divine grace from heaven.

Act of Appointment of Fr. Etienne Semeria to Ceylon, 24 October 1847, EO IV n 1 (Ceylon)

In 1851 Eugene sent Henri Tempier on an important and delicate mission to visit the Oblates and assess their religious and missionary life in Canada. It is with this wish that he missioned him:

Go then in the name of the Lord, well-beloved son, towards that part of our family which is separated from us by so great a distance, which we have always present and intimately united to us, following it as we do with all the affection of our heart. Accomplish faithfully for its good the ministry that has been entrusted to you. May the Most Holy and Immaculate Virgin Mary, our most loving Mother, keep you continually under her protection; may the Angel of God also be propitious to you in your going and in your coming back; during this time, we shall not cease to implore from heaven an abundant shower of graces for you.

Letter to Henri Tempier en route to Canada, 1 May 1851, EO II n 145

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One Response to MAY THE MOST HOLY AND IMMACULATE VIRGIN MARY, OUR LOVING MOTHER, KEEP YOU ALWAYS UNDER HER PROTECTION.

  1. Eleanor Rabnett, Lay Oblate says:
    August 22, 2022 at 13:14

    “…whenever Eugene sent Oblates to the missions outside of France, he entrusted them to Mary Immaculate’s care.” How often do we read but not realise? How many times does it take for the words to enter not just our mind but to burrow in to the deepest parts of our hearts that yearn?

    “…that part of our family which is separated from us by so great a distance, which we have always present and intimately united to us, following it as we do with all the affection of our heart. Accomplish faithfully for its good the ministry that has been entrusted to you.”

    First we must have faith, we must believe that whether it is us being sent, or us witnessing and perhaps being the sender, we must believe that the accompanying message is neither empty nor futile.

    I think of Mary’s faith, her belief and then her lived response of “let it be done unto me…”. Who better to be entrusted into the care of? Who better to intercede for us?

    I think of the many challenges that those early Oblates were faced with, not excluding St. Eugene himself, who shared and continues to share with all of us and whose care they/we have been entrusted to. Do we not do the same thing with those we love and who are separated from us while still being ‘present and intimately” united to us.

    In our love we offer the deepest part of ourselves – our being, our loving… We offer and share the best that we know, our own experience of God and those who God has sent to us.

    This is what it is to be loved and then to love…

    Reply

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