Eugene de Mazenod speaks to us

The “difficulties of my position and my soul’s bitter distress” was caused by the imminent death of a trusted Oblate at the age of 28, and of the departure of another. A double blow for the Oblates.

And now another blow, what can I do in the face of Providence’s severe decrees, what can I do even when faced with the cowardly folly and insensitivity of men? Let us speak no more of Pachiaudi who has so unworthily betrayed the Society and trodden underfoot so many duties. Even so his desertion does leave a gap that I cannot fill;

Eugene was understandably upset by the departure of Fr. Pachiaudi and expressed this harshly. In fact he later entered the monastery of La Grand Chartreuse where he held important positions as a monk.

but still more crushing, tearing at my soul and striking at my very existence, is the desperate condition in which our wonderful and irreplaceable Pons finds himself. For four days he has been betwixt life and death, and short of a miracle he cannot survive. The nature of his illness moreover keeps me in a state of continual anxiety for all these good young brothers who are nursing him with prodigal and heroic charity. He has no less than the most virulent form of typhus, and all those who are nursing him, which includes the whole community, feel in varying degrees the effects of the influence of this sickness that is carrying our dear and precious brother to the grave.

Letter to Jean Baptiste Mille, 15 September 1836, EO VIII n 583

Father Pons was only 28 years old and was a capable and respected professor at the Major Seminary in Marseilles.

So we have to resign ourselves to the loss of one of our best men and it will be a long time before we find a replacement. It is God’s will, that is everything; but it goes to the heart and the gap will make itself felt.

Letter to Hippolyte Courtès, 16 September 1836, EO VIII n 584

We touch Eugene’s suffering and his anxiety for the health of the younger members of the community who were in danger of contracting the contagious disease as they ministered to their brother in the difficult medical circumstances of the 18th century.

We may fall into the danger of thinking that Eugene’s complaints in the preceding letters showed an Oblate congregation that was in a state of chaos. This was definitely not the case.

The demands of the people for the ministry of the Oblates were never-ending. The missionaries responded with zeal and begged Eugene to send more Oblates to their communities – and they complained when he did not comply. Eugene’s response:

Do not add, I beseech you all, to the difficulties of my position and my soul’s bitter distress, the painful experience of your complaints coming in all at the same time and from every direction. Is it my fault that there aren’t more of you and if amongst our small numbers there are so few men of ability? I would give my life to make your number grow, knowing the good works that you could achieve, that offer themselves in every quarter but which will remain undone for lack of workers.

Letter to Jean Baptiste Mille, 15 September 1836, EO VIII n 583

Today, with the blossoming of the charism families in the Church, the Mazenodian Family has come forward to be an integral part of the mission given to the Church by the charism of St Eugene.

“Be” in order to “Do” meant a life of equilibrium. Zeal for mission in defiance of the needs of the body produces few results. Writing to the superior of the Aix community, Eugene insists on equilibrium.

The obligation of seven hours of sleep is imposed to remedy. The extravagant piety of certain men who want to serve God as they see fit in defiance of all reason, common sense, justice and enlightened religion. What can a man do, there’s no cure for crackpots. I urge you to order Father Aubert on my behalf never to take less than seven hours sleep. This young priest needs a lot of sleep, he isn’t willing to admit it but it is obviously so. I noticed it a long time ago and others too have made the same observation. I don’t permit any excuses. I positively insist that he submit to this ruling.

Letter to Hippolyte Courtès, 8 September 1836, EO VIII n 582

Good advice for all of us to prevent us becoming crackpots!

Looking at potential leadership in the Oblates, Eugene identifies the qualities of “being” which result in “doing”: availability, regularity in living by the Rule of Life, detachment and generosity.

But I’m easily upset when I’m faced with men who render themselves unavailable for various positions of trust that I would like to give them, whether because of a lack of virtue or because they don’t give a sufficient assurance of wisdom in their conduct. At the present moment you have two men who could give satisfaction in the most pressing of needs, but what are they like when it comes to regularity, are they living according to the spirit of their holy state of life? Are they detached, available for any task? I sent them to Laus as being an easier way to get them up to the level that every member of the Congregation should achieve. Where are my hopes now? Is it such a difficult thing to be equal to one’s duties? I am saddened in spite of myself when I consider how small some men’s generosity is.

Goodbye, my dear Father Mille, my blessing on you and all the community.

Letter to Jean Baptiste Mille, 23 August 1836, EO VIII n 579

The foundation of the Congregation in 1816 had begun a period of zealous inspiration and overflowing generosity among the founding generation. Twenty years later the we find Eugene frustrated by the cooling off of that initial passion. The second generation of Oblates did not always have the same focus as the founding generation.

Eugene had just completed an official visitation of two communities under the leadership of very young superiors. Exasperated, he wrote:

The comparison between our own practice and the abuses permitted to enter our houses by our young superiors and encouraged by their own example only fills me with distress. Acting in accordance with their ideas, local superiors have just about managed to re-fashion the Congregation. I no longer recognize my spirit in the houses I have just visited, and indeed how could it be found when no one bothers any longer to consult me?

Haven’t I told you often enough, you young superiors, that necessity forced me to place you at the head of our communities long before you were fit to exercise authority, that your major defect has been to follow your own ideas, instead of taking your lead from what has been the practice prior to your arrival. If you had taken pains to follow in our footsteps, you would not have brought in all the abuses that I am having such trouble in rooting out.

Letter to Jean Baptiste Mille, 23 August 1836, EO VIII n 579

Two hundred years later the Mazenodian Family continues to have the responsibility of keeping focused on out foundational charism and the vision it gives us. Would Eugene recognize his spirit in our communities today?

Writing to Father Casimir Aubert, the novice master, Eugene reviews the progress of the novices and concludes with advice regarding one in particular, from which he draws an important lesson for all communities.

Try to bring your influence to bear on Gignoux to get him into the way of a sensible measure of regularity, the way to go about it is to set up some chats with him in which without any affectation you talk about what real perfection consists in.

Don’t neglect this kind of fraternal and trusting sharing with the others as well, it always has good results and ends up forming a family spirit even amongst those who were not drawn to it at the outset. I understand that it can be more agreeable to stay in one’s cell, but that kind of apostolate is more advantageous and more in line with my ideas. Goodbye, very dear son, with my love and blessing.

Letter to Casimir Aubert, 13 June 1836, EO VIII n 577

Eugene’s role as Superior General was to keep those entrusted to his care focused on the spirit of their vocation in the light of the charism he had received. This involved encouraging those who were struggling to keep focussed.

In this letter he writes to Father Hippolyte Courtès, who was responsible for the community in Aix which was being ill-treated by the local bishop and the ecclesiastical authorities.

My dear Son, I was watching each post for one of your letters so as to write to you. I feel that in the position you find yourself, the least I can do is to offer you some consolation and encouragement if not by my presence at least by my words. Who would have said that after twenty-five years of hard work and devotion we would be reduced to the status of suppliants waiting on the grant of a favour or rather, asking just to be allowed to go on living? This violent situation cannot last for ever, but it means we must adopt the late Fr. Emery’s maxim: prepare for a long haul if you don’t want to go under, everyone has to move on eventually. This maxim that my former teacher constantly acted on is wise: somewhat opposed as it is to my temperament. I do urge you to adopt it, or rather, I congratulate you on following it.

Providence wishes our growth to take place in the midst of tribulations. Hardly do we begin to draw breath on one side than we are fired on from the other side. Let us bide our time…

It is time for the community to stand together in confident hope:

Don’t be anxious. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Contradictions must come. I am confident that they are heralds of some good news. But once again, call your little community together and ask them from me to redouble their prayers, to overcome evil by good, to rejoice to be humiliated a little, to renounce all arrogance, I don’t mean of a personal kind, as I’m sure that such a thing can’t be found amongst you, but as a group, choosing humility rather than glory when God wants to have us go that road. Make no mistake, any other course would be pure illusion.

Letter to Hippolyte Courtès, 8 June 1836, EO VIII n 576

Those responsible for the various Oblate communities were very young and full of zeal and innovative ideas. Eugene corresponded regularly with each of them to encourage and guide them. He did, however, condemn any abuse of power when decisions were made without consultation.

It’s a peculiar thing; I am always amazed to see that as soon as one of our men is named superior in a particular community, he sets himself up as the sole master, he arranges everything, orders everything as he sees fit, without making the least effort to ask my advice or to consult the men the Rule appoints as his councillors. In this way our local superiors assert their independence far more than the Superior General who never acts without hearing the men around him.

In insisting on consultation with him, Eugene was not acting as a controlling busybody but as Superior General. The nuance is important because it is connected with the charism given to the Church by the Holy Spirit, of which the Superior General is the custodian. Hence all decisions regarding religious community life and mission had to be made in the light of the charism.

They don’t do this deliberately, rather they are letting themselves be influenced, imitating the fashion, I would nearly say, followed in other places, and that is how abuses set in. It’s about time to correct all this, and since this won’t come about of itself, as it ought. I am going to see to it myself.

Letter to Casimir Aubert, 18 May 1836, EO VIII n 572

The Shrine of Our Lady of Laus was gearing up for the busy summer pilgrimage season during which the Oblates would be feverishly occupied with pastoral ministry to the pilgrims.

Now the feast of Pentecost is upon us, appeal to the whole community, in my name, to take twice as much care to see that the crowds of visitors don’t give rise to a kind of exterior dissipation which wouldn’t be edifying in men from whom one expects behaviour that is not only full of zeal but truly modest, grave and recollected as well.

Eugene reminds them of the principle that he was constantly insisting on in the lives of the Oblates: “be” in order to “do.”

The source of all activity, the goal of all ministry, and the strength to persevere came only from their community life as religious. “Regularity” – faithful observance of the Rule of Life – was the “be” of the Oblates from which the pilgrims would draw abundant graces.

Please, insist a lot on this subject. Let it be demonstrated that, when a religious has to devote himself to external ministry, the habitual regularity that he should have acquired in the bosom of the community is a source of abundant graces and help, so that he isn’t found wanting and doesn’t disappoint the faithful’s expectations: more is required of him than of others in the wholly supernatural action of his demanding work,

Letter to Jean Baptiste Mille, 18 May 1836, EO VIII n 571

“BE” in order to “DO” sums up the Gospel for all, not just the Oblates.

You are invited to take to join the practice of the US Mazenodian Family in a time of prayer on Sunday, October 20, 2019, which is World Mission Sunday.

Mission Sunday 1975 was the day when Pope Paul VI beatified Eugene de Mazenod, recognizing the workings of God in Eugene and in the charism and spirituality he left his religious missionary family.

With Saint Eugene who dedicated his life to bringing the salvation of Jesus Christ to all people, you are invited to set apart some time this day to enter into prayerful communion with the whole Mazenodian Family.

Here are some texts that you may find helpful.

Mark 6: 34 – 37

When Jesus disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things. By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said, “This is a deserted place and it is already very late. Dismiss them so that they can go to the surrounding farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” He said to them in reply, “Give them some food yourselves.

Eugene, at the age of 26, responded to the invitation to feed the most abandoned with the Gospel:

As the Lord is my witness, what he wants of me is that I renounce a world where it is almost impossible to find salvation, such is the power of apostasy there; that I devote myself especially to his service and try to reawaken the faith that is becoming extinct among the poor; in a word, that I make myself available to carry out any orders he may wish to give me for his glory and the salvation of souls he has redeemed by his precious blood.

Pope Paul VI in his beatification homily (19 October 1975):

We will say first of all to the sons of Father de Mazenod, to the members of his family… be very proud, exult with joy ! He was passionate about Jesus Christ and an unconditional lover of the Church! In the aftermath of the French Revolution, Providence would make him a pioneer of pastoral renewal …

From 1841, the Oblates of Mary embarked on the five continents and went to the ends of inhabited lands. Our predecessor Pius XI would say of them: “The Oblates are the specialists of difficult missions!” And Father de Mazenod wanted them to be perfect religious! This Pastor and Founder, an authentic witness of the Holy Spirit sends to all the baptized, to all the apostles of today an imperative reminder: let yourself be invaded by the fire of Pentecost and you will know missionary enthusiasm!

I John 1: 1-2

What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we looked upon and touched with our hands concerns the Word of life— for the life was made visible; we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life that was with the Father and was made visible to us. What we have seen and heard we proclaim now to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us.

See also: oraison-for-october-2019-2

[For further reading, we highly recommend this reflection on the OMIWORLD website: https://www.omiworld.org/2019/09/29/a-missionary-oblate-man-of-action-and-contemplation/]