Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit
At the end of December 1614, our holy Mother recommended humility and resignation to the ladies of Lyon “to serve as a magnet for the guidance of the Holy Spirit”. This theme will guide us throughout the year 1615. It will be a spiritual itinerary reserving for the next course, the exchanges with Bishop de Marquemont. We find the face of the Institute whose features are accentuated, this distinctive stamp of our Visitandine vocation of which our holy Mother says (St. J. de Ch. II p.365): “The true spirit of the Institute is none other than that of Our Lord, truly humble, truly simple, upright, sincere and joyful, in holy innocence and freedom”.
The Holy Spirit, who configures us to Christ, reproduces these features in the community of Lyon. The foundation of Lyon, an inspiration of the Holy Spirit Here is how our holy Founder presented this project to the Duchess of Mantua [protector of the Institute] in a letter written in the name of the Visitandines: “Virtuous ladies of Lyon, who had seen our exercises, inspired, as is to be believed, by the Holy Spirit, wishing to build a house of our Institute and having prepared what is required, have asked us to send them some of our sisters” (St Fr. de S. XVI p.379).
Madame d’Auxerre, actively supporting the inspiration, had bought a house in the Terreaux district. The small community would be born and grow there, until its installation in Bellecour in 1617. Our holy Mother only desired a modest sufficiency. At the beginning of January, she reassured Madame des Gouffiers: “I approve that provision be made in such a way for temporal things that there is no need at the beginning, because that is required. Believe me, the things of God must begin with spiritual riches, let us never doubt that, if we have true piety, Our Lord will give us what is necessary. I have such close and marked experience of this in the house here that I could never fear that Providence will fail those who will work in its service. We began with extreme poverty, nevertheless we lacked nothing. (Correspondence I, letter n°23). She knows well that “the Spirit of God rests only on the humble and fills with himself only the souls who generously empty themselves of all their own research and interests” (Correspondence VI Letter n°2326)
These are the souls who were chosen for this foundation, as the Founder wrote (St Fr. de S. XVI p.287): “Especially since the enterprise is great and since it is the first production of our house (which I desire to produce nothing but good), we want to send there the cream of our congregation”. For eight months, our holy Mother will lead this first swarm composed of Marie-Jacqueline Favre, assistant and director; Péronne-Marie de Châtel, treasurer, spendthrift, supervisor and robière; Marie-Aimée de Blonay, counselor, sacristan, doorkeeper and linen maid.
The departure takes place on January 26. At each of the seven stages, Sister Marie-Aimée gives our holy Mother one of the notes that our blessed Father has entrusted to her (St Fr. de S. XVI p.295ff-UEA p.331ff). Here is an extract from one of them: “Providence will assist you: invoke it with confidence in all difficulties. As you go further, you must take courage and rejoice in pleasing Our Lord, whose contentment alone satisfies all of Paradise. As for me, I am where you are, since the divine Majesty has willed it so eternally. Come, my dear daughter, let us go sweetly and joyfully to do the work that our Master has marked for us.”
Trust in Providence, courage and contentment in the good pleasure of Our Lord, union of hearts, gentleness and joy to accomplish the divine work: this short note is a summary of Salesian doctrine.
In another post: “Our Angels from here [from here] keep their eyes on you and on your little troop and cannot abandon you (…) The Angels from there [from over there] will send their blessings to meet you and watch you go to their places with love, since it is to cooperate in their holy ministry”. She felt this angelic protection well as she approached Lyon, it was February 1st. The next day, the Archbishop presided over the ceremony of the establishment of the new monastery. Madame d’Auxerre, who took back her name of Marie-Renée Trunel, donned the habit of the Visitation the following day.
Heart in God and feet on the ground
The foundresses brought with them not only the Constitutions [of 1613] but also the emblem of their source: an image of the Heart of Jesus that they gave according to tradition to Sister Marie-Renée Trunel (cf. G. Monthel-L’écrit & l’image l’Ordre de la VSM p.302). This would be the first representation of the Sacred Heart in our Order that has been preserved for us. What a symbol in this naïve image! The Heart of Christ is already the bond of unity in between the houses of the Visitation. But if he unites the communities it is because he himself is the life of the sisters who animate them, since we have this particular grace in the Church, not of reproducing one of the mysteries of Christ, but the virtues of his Heart.
When our holy Founder asks for news from Mother Marie-Jacqueline Favre, he knows where to find her: “What is the heart of my very dear daughter doing? I certainly think that it is still very united with that of Our Lord” (St Fr. de S. XVII p.72). The humble Sister Marie-Renée Trunel said to her companions: “Advance, as much as you please into the Heart of the Savior, (…) this is due to the greatness of your love; for me, as a miserable and sinful woman, I will be only too happy to be admitted to the kiss of his sacred feet” (Lives of eight venerable widows p.28). Sister Marie-Renée Trunel died very holy on October 14, 1615 following a fall, the first Visitandine of Lyon, and the second of our sisters to enter the Visitation of Heaven.
Our holy Founder prays for the population of this new hive: “Lord, bless with your holy hand the heart of my most lovable Mother, so that it may be like a fertile source that produces for you several hearts that are of your sacred family and generation” (St Fr. de S. XVI p.304-UEA p.336). Same wish on June 14, feast of the Holy Trinity: “At the same time as the divine Trinity sends back the Spirit of its adoration in the holy Church, it renews, it seems to me, that of the vocation of my dear Mother, who leaving her country without knowing where she was going, but believing in God who had told her: Leave your land, she came to the mountain. God saw her, multiplying her spiritual race like the stars. God be glorified forever, my dear Mother, in whose heart my heart rejoices. May it be, this heart, eternally fixed [fixed] in the sky like a beautiful star that has a great troop around it” (St Fr. de S. XVII p.6-UEA p.353).
Our holy Mother does not think so much of the number as of the growth in the Visitandine virtues. She writes to Sister Jeanne-Charlotte de Bréchard who is assistant and director in Annecy: “Our Lord fills you with his holy blessing, with all our sisters whom I greet closely and lovingly in the bowels of our sweet Savior (…) Lord, make us grow in simplicity, gentleness, humility and cordial charity towards one another.” (Correspondence I-Letter n°24) This great soul has astonishing qualities as an organizer. From Lyon, she closely followed the construction of the church, as if she were in Annecy. In the same letter, she added: “I forgot to tell our dear lord [François de Sales] that he recommend to Mr. Mingon that the masons, whom I salute, do not lack materials (…) Ask those who must, because the masons will destroy [spend] a lot of money and it must not be lacking”. In other letters, she will give him, following spiritual advice, precise instructions for the installation of the pulpit and the confessional, the exit door for the processions without forgetting the jams for the poor and the provisions for the winter; she also sends lace to Françoise who tearfully asked for some from our blessed Father. Love makes her pass with ease from the spiritual life to the things of the earth.
But this love also accomplishes the opposite movement, here is an example in our holy Founder. During the carnival so painful to his heart, he retired to the castle of Sales. It was there that one day he noticed birds pecking at the grains that a servant had thrown on the ground for them, he admired the delicacy of the pigeons who let the little birds come to the feast in turn: “I could not help but come to tears,” he wrote, “to see the charitable simplicity of the doves, and the confidence of the little birds in their charity. (…) This image of virtue did me great good all day long (St Fr de S XVI p.114-UEA p.339). On the spot, he shows us the practice of good thoughts that he advises to Philothée (IVD Part II chapter 13): “Those who love God cannot cease to think of him, to breathe for him, to aspire to him (…) Everything speaks to them in a mute but very intelligible language in favor of their love; all things provoke them to good thoughts.”
This sweet contemplation at the family castle is followed by great sorrows due, doubtless the slanders against him and his brothers following the affair of the “bastinade” in 1613 (cf. Course 10). He writes to his friend M. de Foras who was in the service of the Duke of Nemours (St Fr. de S. XVI p.320): “Having returned from Sales, I found the return of our already too old tribulations, by the slander made against my brothers. (…) Is it possible that His Highness [the Duke of Nemours] loves me, who takes pleasure in the reports that are made to him of my brothers, since he has already found that they were usually impostures, nevertheless he believes them . (…) Certainly, my dear brother, I have glory in being loved by you; but since my misfortune is so great, let us say no more from now on. Only God and our hearts know it. (…) I no longer want you to run the risk of being disgraced.” “My misfortune is so great,” he said, perhaps this is the reason why after the death of his vicar general a few months later, he chose his brother Jean-François for this position; on September 8 he wrote him these words justifying his choice (St Fr. de S. XVII p.49): “This reason alone will be enough for you to accept it and for everyone to approve it: that a large part of the good of this diocese and my honor depends on this position, for which our proximity will urge you to have more care and jealousy than anyone else could take.” He therefore needed unconditional support from him… The letter to Mr. de Foras, quoted above, continued with these words: “A day will come when loving me will no longer be a reproach to anyone”.
From the day of his holy death, everyone claimed to be friends of the Bishop of Geneva. The vile attacks of the world did not prevent him from working on his beloved book: his heart was in God. “While he was perfecting his work in a final revision, new flames set his heart ablaze; as his pen described the marvelous transports of divine love, he had a happy experience of it” (St. Fr. de S. IV p. XIII Introduction to the TAD).
At the canonization process, his relatives would testify that it was on March 25, 1615 that a globe of fire descended on his head, while he was writing a chapter on the mystery of the Incarnation. And the Holy Spirit who sets the heart of the Founder ablaze communicates himself to his daughters. “Giving God Daughters of Prayer”
From Lyon, our holy Mother wrote to Sister Jeanne-Charlotte: “When our one Father has spoken sufficiently to all our sisters in particular, I beg you, when he comes to see you with a little leisure, that you make him speak in common so that we can have some crumbs of the abundance of your consolations” (Correspondence I Letter No. 25). And again: “This dear Father tells me that he will give four sermons on prayer. You are blessed to hear the conceptions and affections of this spirit filled with the most holy Spirit and to see this man so full of God” (Letter No. 26). These sermons deal not only with prayer as such but with all forms of prayer. From the first sermon, he insists on the importance of prayer: “Without it we could not achieve any good, especially since by means of prayer we are taught to do all our actions well.” The same is true of the vitality of our vocation and our mission in the Church, as our Constitutions (n°39) say: “Their intimate union with God, their communion of life with each other, their mysterious apostolic fruitfulness, depend on the quality of their prayer”. Our holy Founder then develops his subject: the final cause of prayer. “All things are created for prayer. (…) The main request that we must make to God is the union of our wills with his, and the final cause of prayer consists in wanting only God”. The Holy Spirit, Master of prayer, always leads us there. A week later, our blessed Father specifies the conditions for praying well: “To pray well, we must recognize that we are poor. A crossbow shooter, the higher he wants to shoot, the lower he pulls the string of his bow. We want our prayer to go to heaven, we must deepen ourselves by the knowledge of our nothingness.”
The second condition is hope, which makes prayer rise like incense upwards. “The third condition: to be grafted onto Jesus crucified, as the bride leans on her Beloved. Let us remain at the foot of this Cross, let us not leave it until we are soaked in the blood that flows from it. Our works have no price if they are not dyed in the blood of our Master, the merit of which makes us pleasing to the divine Majesty.”
To pray well, it is therefore a question of being small in humility, great in hope and united with Jesus crucified. “There are three kinds of prayer,” he says in the following sermon, “vital prayer, mental prayer and vocal prayer. We will not speak now of mental prayer, only of vital and vocal prayer. (…) All the actions of those who live in the fear of God are continual prayers, and this is called vital prayer.” This is maintained by good thoughts.
“Let us now come to vocal prayer,” he continues. “Prayer is nothing other than speaking to God. It is certain that speaking to God without being attentive to Him and to what one says to Him is very unpleasant to Him. God looks more at the heart of the one who prays than at the words. (…) We should come with great reverence to these Offices, prepared quite differently than for particular prayers, because at common prayers we pray for all. (…) With what attention should we not attend them, since the angels are present and repeat up there in the Church triumphant what we say here below. We should never come to the Offices, especially we who say them in song, without making acts of contrition and without asking the assistance of the Holy Spirit, before beginning”.
In this regard, let us jump to the end of 1615. Mother Marie-Jacqueline Favre wrote to the Founder that a fit of laughter seized the community during the Office. He gives in response a lesson on the virtue of religion in which his zeal for divine service shines through, a zeal tempered by his gentleness: “The temptation to laugh in church and at the Office is bad, although it seems only playful and frivolous, because, after charity, the virtue of religion is the most excellent. As charity renders to Our Lord the love that is due to Him according to our power, so religion renders to Him the reverence required, and therefore [therefore], the faults that are committed against them are bad. It is true that in this I do not see great sin since it is against the will; however, one must not leave this without penance. But, dear daughter of my heart, do not frighten these good girls; for from one extreme, they could pass to the other, which is not necessary” (St. Fr. de S. XVII p.117).
To repair the fault, after Matins, honorable amends were made with their faces on the ground and this for nine days, thus the sweet and strong lesson of the Founder will not be forgotten. For us, the advice that he gave in his sermon is interesting: an act of contrition and the invocation of the Holy Spirit, is it not a powerful means of launching our prayer straight from our earth of misery to heaven where the angels sing?
It is mental prayer that is the subject of the last sermon. “In mental prayer there are four parts: meditation, contemplation, impulses and a simple presence of God. Meditation is done as bees gather their honey (…), we go pecking the virtues of Our Lord one after the other to draw from them the affection of imitation. Then we consider them all together with a single glance through contemplation. The bride (Song 5,9-16), after having praised her Beloved for the beauty of his members, concludes: How beautiful is my Beloved, how I love him! (…) The third part of prayer is done by way of impulses, it can be done while going and coming about one’s business. (…) Who prevents you from speaking to God in the depths of your heart? Say short but fervent words. A good way to accustom ourselves to making these impulses is to take the Pater, choosing a sentence for each day. For example, you have taken today: Our Father who art in heaven, you will therefore say the first time: My Father, who art in heaven; a quarter of an hour later you will say: If you are my Father, when will I be perfectly your daughter? Thus you will go on continuing your prayer from quarter of an hour to another. (…) The Bridegroom says that his beloved has ravished his heart with one of her eyes and one of her hairs. This Bridegroom means: Although my beloved is very busy, she does not stop looking at me with one eye, protesting to me by this look that she is all mine. She has ravished my heart with one of her hairs which hangs on her collar, that is to say by a thought which descends from the side of her heart”.
To ravish the Heart of Jesus, two attitudes are required: uprightness of intention, this unique gaze which directs towards Him what we do and what we are. The second consists of good thoughts, vital prayer: “let everything serve us to go to God, so our life will be one continual prayer” (St. J. de Ch. II p.532).
Our blessed Father did not have time to speak of the simple presence of God, the fourth part of prayer, but the Treatise that will soon appear will fill this gap (Book VI chap.7 to 11). Training in prayer was the sole concern of our sisters, our holy Mother will keep the memory of it: “My dear daughters, let us restore our innocence of times gone by; at the beginning of our Institute, we spoke so much of these prayers, we took so much pleasure in them. It was a beautiful thing to see the fervor that was among our sisters; it is true, it greatly animates” (St. J. de Ch. II p.300).
We miss such simplicity, but we feel the need for in-depth sharing on the Word of God, the Treatise on the Love of God, etc. The document on Fraternal Life in Community (n°32) gives the meaning of these exchanges: “Communion is born from the sharing of the goods of the Spirit, from a sharing of faith and in faith where the bond uniting brothers is all the stronger as what is shared is more central and more vital.” Prayer, continual union with God in love is life of the Visitation, according to the Founder. This is the response that Bishop de Marquemont received from him around June 1615.
Let us listen to it in its historical context (St Fr. de S. XVII p.16): “It is to give God daughters of prayer and souls so interior that they are found worthy of serving his infinite Majesty and of adoring him in spirit and in truth. (…) I want my daughters to have no other pretension than to glorify him by their abasement; that this little Institute be like a poor dovecote of innocent doves, whose care and employment is to meditate on the law of the Lord without making themselves seen or heard in the world; that they remain hidden in the hole in the stone, to give to their Beloved living and dying, proofs of the pain and love of their hearts, by their low and humble groaning.” Popes Pius X, Pius XI and Benedict XVI referred to these words of the Founder, thus showing that the Church sees in them an expression of our charism (Texts at the end of this course). Our Lady, by a secret visitation with which she visited their hearts, joined them and united them together
Here is another facet of our Visitandine vocation. It appears for the first time in the constitutions that our blessed Father wrote during the autumn. Article 27 prescribes to the Director: “Above all, she will try to impress on the hearts of her novices that all the sisters of the congregation must have only one heart and one soul with continual memory that Our Lord, by his inspiration and vocation, and Our Lady, by a secret visitation with which she visited their hearts, joined them and united them together, so that they would never be separated in love and dilection, but that they would remain in unity of spirit by the bond of charity, which is the bond of perfection.” It is therefore in 1615 that we see these words emerge which echo the wishes written on the first page of the book of vows. They say something about our identity and our vocation in the Church. The Holy Spirit who presides over the mystery of the Visitation, also animates the hearts of these first Visitandines and brings them together in unity. Our holy Founder rejoices: “Our sisters work wonders and incite my heart to much gratitude towards the goodness of God, of which I see such clear effects in their souls. I hope that those beyond [Lyon] give you similar feelings, and that this heavenly sweetness thus pours its Spirit on all this little assembly of creatures united for his glory” (St Fr. de S. XVI p.361-UEA p.351).
Same joy in our holy Mother who writes to Sister Jeanne-Charlotte: “O good Savior! fill with yourself the hearts of these dear daughters that you have assembled and make us one in you, my God” (Correspondence I-Letter n°33). “May these hearts that you have assembled be lilies in purity, so that you may take your delights there and that, aided by your divine presence, we may all together and at all times of our lives, offer you the perfumes of a holy humility, mortification and perfect obedience! (…) The sweet Jesus be the honor, the love and the Heart of our heart!” (Letter No. 34). But to “remain in unity of spirit”, the convergence of yes to the divine will is necessary. Our holy Founders set the example. To Sister Jeanne-Charlotte who desires her return, our holy Mother responds: “You move me when you speak to me of seeing myself again in our poor little retreat in Annecy which is my place of sweetness, since it possesses, I can tell you, all my spiritual good in Jesus Christ, in the person of our very honored Father. Nevertheless, I am very happy to remain here, as much as it will please the divine Majesty, too happy to (…) suffer the deprivation of a good that is precious to me, for the sole love of his most holy will, which will forever be the sovereign love of our love.” (Correspondence I Letter No. 25)
Let us now see our holy Founder in the practice of indifference and union with the divine will. Our holy Mother, who has doubtless let slip a feeling of exile, receives this response: “We must cultivate the most holy indifference to which Our Lord calls us. Whether you are there or here, who can separate us from the unity that is in Our Lord? (…) Since our most lovable unity subsists everywhere, thanks to Him who made it. (…) Let us remain in peace under this assurance” (St. Fr. de S. XVI p.359-UEA p.349). But the health of our holy Mother deteriorated so much that the faithful doctor of the community of Annecy was sent to Lyon by our holy Founder. On May 14, he wrote to Sister Marie-Jacqueline Favre: “I have my eyes on this infinite Providence, whose decrees will forever be the laws of my heart. I hope that divine Goodness, in consideration of our congregation made in her name and for her glory, will leave us this very useful Mother (…). All that e God will order will be received with resignation” (St. Fr. de S. XVI p.363). The same day, he describes to our holy Mother the state of their unique heart (St. Fr. de S. XVI p.364-UEA p.351): “This morning, being a little alone, he made an exercise of resignation like no other. Blessed are the souls who live by the will of God alone! If to savor only a little of it by a passing consideration, one has so much spiritual sweetness in the depths of the heart that accepts this holy will with all the crosses that it presents, what will it be like for souls all soaked in the union of this will?” The Holy Spirit, who makes him taste this sweetness, led him to this blessed state of constant union with the divine will. “From this perfect union,” said our holy Mother, “came his eminent virtues, this universal indifference that one ordinarily saw in him. Certainly, I do not read the chapters that deal with it in the ninth Book of Divine Love without clearly seeing that he practiced what he taught. (Correspondence II, letter no. 630)”
He had a singular joy in teaching this indifference to strong souls who resembled him. “The congregation is founded spiritually on Mount Calvary” Mother Marie-Jacqueline Favre, who is only 23 years old, is well animated by the spirit of strength, but she is unaware of it. At the beginning of October she now finds herself alone at the head of the community facing the powerful Archbishop. At the end of the month, after a stay in Burgundy, our holy Mother is back in Annecy. She hastens to comfort her: “How much consolation I have and how much I have given to our most worthy Father, when I told him of your conduct and the hope I have of the great service you will render to Our Lord. I wish you nothing but perseverance, and above all that you keep your spirit in gentleness, strength and joy” (Correspondence I Letter n°46). The nostalgia for Annecy sometimes saddens her, so our holy Founder does not hesitate to give her this firm lesson: “Girls who are married renounce the presence of fathers, mothers and their country to submit to husbands of unknown moods, in order to make them children for this world. It is necessary that the daughters of God have an even greater courage to form in holiness and purity of life children for his divine Majesty” (St Fr. de S. XVII p.79). A few weeks later: “Do you not see that our little congregation is like a sacred fountain from which many souls will draw the waters of their salvation, and that many already want to build other similar congregations for the great glory of God and the great ease of salvation for many? Do not tire of being a mother.” (St. Fr. de S. XVII p.114)
The novice mistress, Sister Marie-Aimée de Blonay, also needs support: “God will suggest to you all that he wants of you, if in the innocence and simplicity of your heart, with complete resignation of your inclinations, you often ask him: Lord, what do you want me to do? (…) As you undertake, under the strength of holy obedience, many things for God, he will support you with his help and will do your work with you, if you want to do his with him. Now, his is the sanctification and perfection of souls” (St Fr. de S. XVII p.105). The Lyon community in turn receives its share of encouragement and benefits from a beautiful portrait of the Visitandine according to the heart of the Founder: “I greet our professed sisters [PM of Châtel and MA of Blonay] with the heart that they know, and our novices [there are six of them] with a heart that they do not know. Hey God, pour out upon them the spirit of gentleness and simplicity, the spirit of love and humility, the spirit of obedience and purity, the spirit of joy and mortification!” In the picture of the Visitandine that he has just painted, there is still a touch missing. He shared this with Mother Marie-Jacqueline Favre (St Fr. de S. XVII p.102): “I [want] from now on to try to give generosity to the devotion of our sisters, and to remove from it the tenderness that we often have for ourselves, this little softness that takes away rest and makes us desire spiritual particularities, makes us excuse our moods and flatter our inclinations. But it is not the job done, although in truth all are moving towards it”. It is, as he will say in an Interview (On Generosity), “the strength and generosity of spirit that one must have to be a daughter of the Visitation”.
Our holy Mother always associates prayer and mortification, she even states: “It is better to be a daughter of mortification than of prayer” (St. J. de Ch. II p.467). “It is necessary (…) that at the same time as we advance in prayer, we advance in mortification” (P.337). In this sense, the constitutions of 1615 in the article of the Director were enriched with directives for the formation of novices (St Fr. de S. XXV p.389): “The teachings that she will give them will be principally t of the end for which they must have withdrawn from the world, which is in order to unite themselves more perfectly with God; to separate themselves from themselves, (…) recalling all their strength to the service of Our Lord (…) [by chastity, poverty and obedience]; and that the congregation is founded spiritually on Mount Calvary, to consider Jesus Christ crucified for love of us, so that all the sisters learn to crucify their senses, passions, inclinations and moods for love of him. She will therefore exercise the novices in humility, obedience, gentleness, modesty, increasing their courage and tearing away, as much as possible, the tenderness and insipid moods which have accustomed to weaken the spirits, so that, like strong girls, they do works of a solid and powerful perfection. And because the undertaking is great, it will teach them not to trust in themselves, but to place all their trust in God and in the protection of the glorious Virgin Mary.”
Again in 1615, this characteristic trait of the Visitation vocation appears: “The spiritual foundation on Mount Calvary.” This expression echoes the intuition of June 10, 1611: “The dying Savior gave birth to us by the opening of his Sacred Heart.” From the cross springs life. What do the daughters of the Visitation on Mount Calvary? They crucify themselves, for the love of Jesus crucified, in the practice of small virtues, but it is to give life by “a secret apostolic fecundity.” How much this fecundity is desired by the friends of our holy Founder! The Father General of the Carthusians wrote to him: “Passing through Lyon, I tasted and praised the sweetness and piety of the honey of your dear bees, which have cast their first swarm in this city where they are held in great esteem. (…) Persevere, Monseigneur, in making such a gift to our France, would to God that Grenoble already possessed a convent of your dear daughters (1618), as a relic of your spirit that we see shining so much in them.” (St Fr. de S. XVI p.398).
A fellow student of our holy Founder, Father Binet s.j., senses that the Visitation will be populated with fervent souls and will also have a happy influence on society (St Fr. de S. XVI p.399): “I see you busy, and not in a hurry, in cultivating your little earthly paradise. I praise God with a joyful heart that you have transplanted the root and branches to France, where they already give off an odor of piety that will restore devotion and rekindle the fire of holy love in many hearts of ice. It seems to me that I see all of Heaven laughing with contentment and all of Hell shuddering with rage against this new way of following Jesus Christ, where so many good souls will find the way to the beautiful Paradise. If I were useful in any way to their service, here is my puny person that I offer to your lordship. » (And he will keep his word!) The first, our holy Founder perceived this fecundity, he wrote to our holy Mother (St Fr. de S. XVI p.361-UEA p.351): “How many obligations we have to Our Lord, and how much confidence we must have that what his mercy has begun in us, he will complete, and will give such increase to this little oil of good will that we have, that all our vessels [vases] will be filled with it and many others with those of our neighbors. We must only close the room well on ourselves, that is to say, withdraw more and more all our heart into this divine Goodness”. The more we withdraw into Our Lord, the more ardent apostolic zeal becomes.
We see this double movement of withdrawal and universal expansion of prayer in the constitutions of 1615. If they impose new restrictions on enclosure, they also present a more marked apostolic spirit (St Fr. de S. XXV p.390 and 96): “She [the director] will make the novices take the spirit of a very affectionate love towards each one, to pray to God for the salvation of all; especially towards the Catholic Church and all the prelates and officers of it, praying often and doing their spiritual exercises for the exaltation of the Catholic faith and for the conversion of the infidels and sinners, as well as for all the Christian princes (…). She will often announce to them the sincere dilection towards all the Orders of Religion which are in the Church, so that not only do they pray for them but that they learn to respect them cordially”. We have the grace of having a pastor, a bishop as founder, he communicated his apostolic spirit to his little Institute. It is a very Marian apostolate, one could say: that of good example and prayer. With what joy the Founder will soon speak of his daughters: “In truth, I can say that they are of very good edification for all (…) who (…) confess that their way of life can only come from the Holy Spirit. Also they pray particularly for the holy Church” (Mission and Spirit p.21). In his humility, he sees only the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but with what care did he second his action! Also what gratitude animated the “souls who were so happy to be called by the Spirit of God to begin this so pious way of life” (Preface Constitutions 1618).
Mother Favre is one of these souls, she receives this response in December 1615: “I am consoled more than can be said to see that you ardently cherish your vocation; this alone can sanctify you, and nothing without it” (St Fr. de S. XVII p.101). To ardently love our vocation because it is a gift of the Holy Spirit, a gift that the dying Savior gave us by the opening of his Heart and the fruit of a secret visitation of Our Lady. To love our vocation because everything is arranged to make us daughters of prayer hidden on Mount Calvary in order to help the Holy Church. To love one’s vocation is the spring of humble daily fidelity. This is why each day the Directory (Art.6) makes us give thanks for the good of our vocation. Love is never idle, it urges us to cultivate this gift, “in order to all feel the same love and all live in the same accord of this vocation”. This is the primary goal of these conversations on our Institute (cf. 1st Course): we meditate on the origins of the Visitation, reading through its history the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Through this meditation, “like bees, we go pecking the virtues of [our vocation] one after the other to draw from them the affection of imitation. Then we consider them all together with a single glance through contemplation, to conclude by saying: “How beautiful [is my vocation], how I love it!” This alone can sanctify us, says our holy Founder again, in order to contribute to a greater holiness of the whole Body of Christ and to its effectiveness of Redemption (cf. Constitutions n°139).
He already marvels at it in this same letter of December 1615 “Thanks to God, we see that his divine Providence wants to use it for the good of many souls in various places (Moulins, Grenoble, Bourges, Paris…) where this congregation is desired, which by miracle is fertile at the very moment of its birth”.
We have seen today, the little Institute take root in the life of prayer, a hidden life woven of small and strong virtues, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Through Him, souls are perfected in this holy vocation and communicate to others the life of love that animates them. We could compare the Visitation in 1615 to a young fruit tree.
The time is coming when we will see, it will be in the next course, how our blessed Father will be led to prune it to give it its definitive form according to the designs of Providence and to preserve the branches which, by ramifying, will bear the fruits of holiness for the glory of God and the life of the Church.
WORK – OUR HOLY FOUNDERS: THE TREATISE ON THE LOVE OF GOD BOOK VI CHAPTER 11 ANSWER OF OUR HOLY MOTHER MISSION & SPIRIT P.56 TO 58 What dispositions are required to remain in the prayer of simple presence of God? –
OUR HOLY MOTHER: LIFE & WORKS VOLUME III – CONSOLING WORDS DECEMBER – THE SPIRIT OF THE INSTITUTE: Which paragraph do you prefer and why? –
POPES ST. PIUS X, PIUS XI AND BENEDICT XVI SPEAK OF THE VISITATION (texts below): What common points and what particular insistences for each? * * * * * * *
St. Pius X Brief 01/16/1910: It was the thought of the holy Doctor to form for God daughters in whom would reside the spirit of grace and prayer; who would adore him in spirit and in truth, and would apply themselves, by the humiliation of the spirit and the contempt of themselves, to extend his glory; who, like doves hidden in their silent nest, renouncing all earthly things and immersed in the contemplation of the things of Heaven, would offer themselves to God as living hosts. This is the rule that has been set for you by the holy Bishop of Geneva and his blessed disciple: as long as the authority of this legislation remains in force among you, your Institute will be able to subsist in its integrity. Pius XI Brief 21.08.1928: Like the mustard seed, the Institute of the Visitation had humble beginnings and a beautiful development. This Institute, in the thought of Francis de Sales, was to promote the blossoming of the interior life in souls who would like to follow Our Lord Jesus Christ. They could, by a special grace of God, withdraw from the world, reproduce the humble life of our Redeemer, lead an existence hidden in God, nestle in some way in the divine Heart, resolutely master their thoughts, their feelings, their passions, their desires, the inclinations of their soul, and, nailing themselves, so to speak, to the cross, place themselves solely at the service of Jesus Christ.
Benedict XVI Letter to the Superior of Annecy et to the Order of the Visitation 06/17/2010: In this year when the Order of the Visitation of Saint Mary celebrates the 4th centenary of its foundation, I am happy to unite myself in thought and prayer to the thanksgiving of all the nuns who, throughout the world, pursue a life of prayer and work, in the spirit bequeathed by Saint Francis de Sales and Saint Jeanne-Françoise de Chantal. In instituting, in 1610, a new model of consecrated life, Francis de Sales wanted to “give God daughters of prayer and souls so interior that they are found worthy of serving his infinite Majesty and of adoring him in spirit and in truth.” The search for holiness in daily occupations, based on gentleness and humility, simplicity and peace of heart, doing everything through love and nothing through force is at the heart of the spirituality of the Visitation of Saint Mary. This legacy bequeathed by Saint Francis de Sales and Saint Jeanne-Françoise de Chantal is very relevant in the contemporary world, where men and women feel increasingly overwhelmed by the crushing weight of personal affirmation at all costs, of career, wealth, selfishness and hedonism, which make people, especially the young, fragile and defenseless. I hope that this jubilee will allow you to renew the freshness of your contemplative vocation! In silence and hidden life, bear constant witness to how the total gift of oneself to the love of God can fill the heart of the human person. May prayer and the search for the face of the Lord be the soul and foundation of your monasteries! May the nuns, following the example of the Holy Founders of the Order, progress on the path of holiness, in gentleness, humility and simplicity, and may the bond of charity maintain the union of hearts between the sisters and between the monasteries, for a better service of the Church. Entrusting the Order of the Visitation of Saint Mary, each of its monasteries and each of the nuns to the intercession of the Virgin Mary, of Saint Francis de Sales and Saint Jeanne-Françoise de Chantal, I address to you an affectionate Apostolic Blessing, as well as to all the people who are in spiritual relation with your monasteries.
Source; Soeur Marie-Pierre