SHOW THEM A LIGHT MORE BRILLIANT THAN THE SUN

With his health restored after his prolonged break, Eugene returned to Aix and to the activities of the Missionaries. The season for preaching parish missions was approaching. They were about to set out to the village of Fuveau for their second mission as a community.

We are committed to work in villages for the whole mission season. Particular circumstances oblige us to begin even in advance; indeed we will be setting forth on the first of September.

Usually the village missions took place in the colder months when the villagers were not so busy with their crops. In the case of Fuveau, the circumstances were different because of the around 1500 inhabitants more than half were coal-miners and were not bound to the seasons of the year for their activities.

We are going to preach underground perhaps. Please God that we could make ourselves heard even in hell. I do not joke by saying that since we may be preaching underground; we are going to do this first mission in a region inhabited only by miners who spend their lives in coal pits. I expect we will be obliged to go and unearth them, showing them a light more brilliant than the sun and which will blind them less.

Letter to Forbin Janson, July-August, 1816, O.W. VI n. 13

 

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1 Response to SHOW THEM A LIGHT MORE BRILLIANT THAN THE SUN

  1. Eleanor Rabnett, Lay Oblate says:

    Eugene and his founding community – not demanding that people to come to them but rather going out to: even to the extent of ensuring that every person who lived in Fuveau was able to receive the Good News. It would be like giving a mission twice in the same place at the same time. To preach the Good News in such a way and so to pray “Please God that we could make ourselves heard even in hell” (that was the coal mines).

    Is it any wonder that when Marius Suzanne first heard Eugene and his missionaries speak that he wanted to join their small community. He too was learning who he was in the eyes of God.

    Sadly this morning I think of some of our Church’s leaders speaking more loudly about who they deem to be unworthy of the sacraments – those in our times who are truly some of the poorest of the poor. Who will go out to invite them to learn who they are in the eyes of God? It appears that some of the very structures of the Church are deciding who is worthy of God and passing laws to ensure that the Good News is afforded only to those who look and act like themselves. As if Jesus died for only a few rather than for all. For a moment my heart’s eyes see the image of Salvador Dali’s portrait of Jesus – our crucified Saviour sent to redeem all of creation.

    In these difficult times I am so grateful for having met St. Eugene, for having been invited to be a member of his Mazenodian Oblate Family who are living models in the light of Jesus and his disciples: men and women going out into some of the darkest corners of our world to “show them a light more brilliant than the sun and which will blind them less.”

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