Eugene de Mazenod speaks to us

13. Once I have identified something as an obstacle to my end, I will make the sacrifice of it to God, cost what it may, and taking the resolutions necessary to walk in the spirit of my vocation, I will be faithful thereto with the help of grace.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

Quite a thought! Usually we try to overcome and destroy the obstacles that prevent us from loving God and one another. Eugene uses another tactic – he offers it to God and relies on receiving the inspirations and graces necessary to change. Weaknesses, failings and obstacles become an opportunity to encounter God’s grace. A thought-provoking approach to oblation.

In previous retreat notes we have seen that when Eugene was using the Ignatian retreat method, he used to refuse to do the set meditations on hell, which required him to conjure up pictures of horror. He judged it as a conjuring up of a fantasy world that revolted him.

12. I will gladly include too that of hell which figured little in my other retreats, but if I want to make effective use of it where I am concerned, my approach must be quite the opposite of that indicated in some books. No “representation of place,” no pictures of demons or of the damned, no going into the details of torments, for it is my experience that all that fantasy-world usually conjured up, far from frightening my mind, revolts me and damages my conviction which cannot be based on things it can refuse to believe, or at least that it can look on as exaggerations, or as the produce of someone’s imagination.

Hell for Eugene was “being deprived of God” – the worst imaginable punishment for someone who loved God passionately and to whom he had made the oblation of his life:

So I will stay with what is of faith, and above all with the consideration of being deprived of God, as opposed to the beatitude of the elect in heaven.

In this way I will reach a conviction of the futility of things the search for which can cause one to lose the unique good that is God.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

Continuing to reflect on Eugene’s resolutions as he entered retreat, we encounter another very practical motivation for doing a good retreat: the possibility of death. He gives the impression that he considered 50 to be a ripe old age – perhaps in 1831 it was! But more seriously, cholera had broken out in some of the ports of the Mediterranean, and it was a matter of time before it reached the port of Marseilles.

9. Among other motivations for going to the heart of the matter, I will consider my age (I have entered my fiftieth year) and the scourge of God that is threatening us. It is good to think about my half-century, for it is forgotten when one’s health is good, and about the cholera morbus for it seems too far away when talking about it. However, one does not cease to grow old because one feels like a thirty-year-old, and if cholera comes all of a sudden one has to become dedicated without delay and confront all its dangers. And to do that one must be ready to appear before God.

10. So in this retreat one must envisage death a little more close-up than usually. When one feels young and in good health, one sees before one a long series of years, and no sign of bodily dissolution. One has to call in aid the imagination to dream up an illness without having any of the symptoms, and which since it has nothing of the real world about it arouses none of the conviction for fearing death it is supposed ought to follow on it. But when one is persuaded that one is getting old, that one might have died on two occasions in a month, then when one tells oneself that cholera could arrive any day by land or sea, and once it has come, it could dispatch you in a few hours, the argument is more cogent, and the conclusion easier.

11. So the thought of death can therefore be employed this time more successfully than usual.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

Conversion is a daily task that helps us to re-focus on our priorities. What means was Eugene to use to achieve the desired conversion? The practical Eugene did not do this in his head – it was by examining the quality of his actions, of the way in which he put his spirituality into practice in everyday life.

6. I am feeling somewhat vague about it, but I will achieve conviction by challenging my way of carrying out my duties.

7. I will subject them all to a close scrutiny, first those of a priest, then those of a religious. In examining the former I will look at myself in my role as vicar general, and while delving deeper into the latter I will dwell especially on myself in that of superior.

“By their fruits you shall know them” – thus the true depth of conversion could only be measured by the way in which he shared the fruits through his ministry and responsibilities. During his retreat he would use two practical means of evaluation:

8. The Pontifical on the one hand and the Rule Book on the other will provide me with material.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

The “Pontifical” was the book of ceremonies and duties that he had to fulfil as Vicar General to his uncle, Bishop Fortuné. The Oblate Rule was the code that he had to live by and uphold in the Congregation.

Why enter into a time of retreat? Eugene’s zeal and desire to be “all for God” could not stop at a half-measure of becoming better. It was all or nothing for him: total conversion to God. Life was a process of continual conversion for him – and a time of retreat aimed at renewing his self-gift of oblation totally.

5. My starting point will be that it is a question this time of a retreat of conversion and not of perfection, i.e., my business is not to become better but to become good.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

He was renewing the resolution he had made twenty years before, at the time of his ordination to the priesthood:

To please you, act for your glory, will be my daily task, the task of every moment of my life. I wish to live only for you, I wish to love you alone and all else in you and through you.

Notes made during the retreat in preparation for priestly ordination, December 1-21, E.O. XIV n.95

This is what we understand by “oblation” as a Mazenodian Family.

Realistically, Eugene realizes that in order to enter into prayer he has to struggle to break away from the grip of work and its demands – otherwise his attempts at prayer will be like swimming against a torrent of water that is impossible to conquer.

3. Then enter a state of absolute mental and physical relaxation without striving to produce anything. It would be tantamount to swimming against the stream with a lot of stress and little success to act in any other way on leaving behind this commotion, this pile-up of business of every kind in which I am habitually mired.

Here he touches the essence of prayer: the necessity to work for a mental and physical relaxation so that God can take over. This relaxing is an integral part of the process of prayer – it is prayer. “Let go, let God”

4. Once the torrent has subsided and I begin to be alone with myself, I will ask God for his grace to make a fruitful retreat. I will pray with all the fervour I am capable of to the Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph, my guardian Angel and other saints.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

Before Eugene began his retreat, a more intense time dedicated to prayer, he made a number of resolutions to ensure the success of this time of solitude in the presence of God.

Praised be Jesus Christ, and Mary Immaculate

This is what I have to do in this retreat:

1. Isolate myself totally from my ordinary tasks, not want to hear a word about them whatever may happen.

2. See no one from outside who may even simply remind me of them.

Retreat resolutions, October 1831, EO XV n 162

The first two resolutions are conditions for a successful retreat. If it is a time dedicated to be with God, then it is essential to cut off from everyday concerns and anything that reminds us of them. This does not mean that we don’t pray about these concerns, but the retreat is not a time to dwell on them and solve problems.

The same advice applies to our moments of daily prayer, whether they be 5 or 60 minutes in duration: we need to switch off to allow ourselves to be with God.

Eugene had lived a very difficult couple of years due to his illness, which necessitated a long recovery. As he was recovering, he was then battered by the political events and persecution caused by the July 1830 Revolution and the anti-religious stance of the new government. At the end of 1831 there was now the danger of a cholera epidemic about to reach the port of Marseilles. He was willing to endanger his life, if necessary, to work for the salvation of the victims – just as he had done in 1814. In order to have the courage to imitate the oblation of Jesus for the salvation of others, he went on a retreat to pray for the graces he needed to be an Oblate for the sake of those most in need.

… today I started a retreat, impelled by the need for recollection and the desire to prepare myself for death in case the cholera requires me to devote myself to the salvation of those of my brothers who will be struck down by it. I take the liberty to recommend myself to your prayers to gain from God the graces I need…

Letter to Count de Montalembert, 24 October 1831, EO XIII n 78

We have the notes of this retreat, and I will be using them for our daily reflections in these coming days.

During our pause I invite you to consult the many reflections on this website which have been published since 2010.

I also invite you to consult the actual writings of St Eugene online.

You can find theses in chronological order at https://www.eugenedemazenod.net/?page_id=2362 

Thanks to the generous work of many, this chronological version is now available (98% complete).

On our OMIWORLD site you will also find the volumes in digital form, as they were originally published in book form:  https://www.omiworld.org/our-charism/founder/writings/