1826 Roman Diary

Roman Diary

Oblate Writings XVII

Roman Diary 1825-1826

Rome

February 17, 1826
17: Before going to see Bishop Gamberini⁶² of Orvieto who had given me an appointment for this morning, I went to the Roman College to say mass in the room where Saint Aloysius Gonzaga⁶³ used to live. It is on the third floor of the house and overlooks the courtyard. It seems that it was transformed into a chapel at the time of the saint’s beatification. The same door and window are still there; but now people go in through a different door, since the old one is condemned, even though it is still there and in good condition, except slightly worm-eaten as are the window shutters. It is a large room; it looks as if two scholastics used to live in it. It is tapestried in crimson damask, with golden borders. There is a wooden altar; below the altar is the casket wherein the saint’s body lay for fifty years. Hanging from the walls, you can see several paintings depicting events in the saint’s life and his holy death. These paintings used to be in the apartments of the venerable Cardinal Bellarmine⁶⁴. The room that you see today is not the one in which the saint died; I believe the infirmary was situated where the present church is, which was not yet built at that time.
Not far from that room is the one in which the Venerable Berchmans used to live⁶⁵, and beyond that the one used by a martyr whose name I have forgotten. Near the room of Saint Aloysius you can see a rather nice, very well decorated chapel, where the saint made his vows. I stopped there for a moment to pray. In the sacristy of this chapel they show an image of our Lord crucified that the saint used to take with him on trips. Now it has a silver frame as do two of his handwritten letters that they preserve. I am not sure that these frames were silver; they seemed to me to be of this metal, but since I was taken up with the main object, I could be wrong. Time was running out on me, so I said goodbye to Father Taparelli, the college rector, and hurried to Bishop Gamberini who received me correctly. He is one of the most outstanding men of the Roman Court; before being named Bishop of Orvieto, he had occupied extremely important posts; he will quite likely be a cardinal and I do not think he will be among the last named.

To Bro. Nicolas Riccardi at Marseilles.⁶⁶

225:VII in Oblate Writings

Reproaches and counsels Bro. Riccardi who has fled from the novitiate. Exhorts him to repent and return to an Oblate community under the direction of Fr. Tempier.
Riccardi

Rome

February 17, 1826.
Is it derisively, my dear Riccardi, that you still call me Father and mock me when you say you will submit yourself entirely to what I judge best for your salvation? Had you forgotten what I had judged best for your salvation when you wrenched yourself from my bosom and did you not know the motives which had resolved me to receive you in the Society? You said it when you repeated these words: “I feel that I am very little suited to the ministry”, that is to say when you would be on your own and deprived of the help that would have been given you by the Society which had received you with as much charity as you have shown disdain for it. However, I ought to tell you that when, upon directing you for some time and coming to know your character well, I had to decide on your vocation according to the desires that you expressed to me, I put aside my position as superior and decided in your interests, considering myself in this circumstance as responsible for seeking and assuring your happiness to the extent that I could. Perhaps, if I had acted in my twofold capacity, I would have kept in mind the risk which the Society incurred through the deficiency of your character but, being sure of the good that would result for you from entering the Society in which and with the help of which you would put to good advantage the talents that the good God had given you, while otherwise they would be almost useless, and also convinced you would find therein a powerful remedy against your perplexities and incertitudes, I do not say your scruples in the wake of the stubborn, multiple and voluntary faults that you had the boldness to commit, I did not hesitate for I believed you had a conscience, feelings, a heart. I did not doubt you would be enamoured right from the start with all the delight to be found in a family devoted to God and to the Church, making great strides in the ways of perfection, of which some of the members were preparing themselves by the practice of the most excellent virtues to become worthy ministers of the mercy of God to the people, while the others, by assiduous work and efforts of zeal that would be admirable in the greatest saints, reproduce the marvels operated by the preaching of the first disciples of the Gospel. It is not my fault if your heart shut out the sweet emotions that grace no doubt would have aroused therein had you offered yourself to God with more generosity and less diffidence, had you not glanced back so much as you calculated the advantages that the world could offer you and listened to the voice of flesh and blood. Men of this stamp have never done any good in the Church, I do not see any raised to the honours of the altar and I doubt that there are any in heaven. You would tremble if I translated for you what the Blessed Alphonse foresaw in regard to young men deceived like you by sinister illusions, and unfaithful like you to the grace of their vocation. I have under my eyes his terrible words and unfortunately also the proof that verifies his prognostics.
I cannot say otherwise or better than this great saint: “Woe to you for not having known the voice and the day of the Lord, indeed say I, for having scorned his voice upon hearing it”. Your conscience cries out in spite of you. You rap out one after the other four lines which form a sequence in your letter: “I understand the loss that I suffer by leaving the community, I would be in despair if, and I know this only too well, I was obliged to leave it for ever, I feel that I am made to live in community”. Say rather that you have a need, an extreme need, to live in community. That is why you are right in what you understand, but you do not understand enough the sorrow you cause by leaving the community. But if it is beyond doubt that you need to live in community, and if it is true you would have reason to despair were you obliged to leave it for ever, it is not less true that the community needs from those who form it that they do not give her the distasteful spectacle of an acute disorder, of an insulting disdain, of a disedifying irregularity, or a scandalous desertion, all of which trouble her tranquillity, her peace, her happiness, and even compromise her existence. Nothing can excuse your conduct, it is execrable in every way. You have let the Society down; your defection has not only been a scandal, you have hurt her substantially by the bad impression your fault must have made on the feeble souls who are not ready for such blows; and in quite another manner, you have let God down by trifling with what is sacred amongst men since in scorn of your engagements you have taken counsel only with your exalted imagination. You have obeyed only your own caprice or rather let us say, the demon who alone could inspire you with a resolve so contrary to your true interests as well as your sacred duties towards God. Nothing in your position could justify your doing what you have done with yourself. Of all the motives that you put before me, only one would deserve to be examined by those having a right to pronounce themselves; it is that of your mother. There had been some question about this, but we did not find her to be in gravely exceptional circumstances such as could have blocked you from following your vocation. I rectify, in passing, the error you have fallen into, that of believing you are in a position in which a professed religious can ask and obtain his secularization that is granted but only by way of permitting that one help one’s mother by engaging in some lucrative ministry.
Because a mother cannot live on her means and is obliged for example to obtain a pension to provide for her needs, would it result that the son has to sacrifice his vocation and frankly engage in occupations or ministries which are not only less perfect than the life to which he is called, but also leave him open to performing his duties badly and failing to achieve or at least achieving his salvation with difficulty? First there would surely have been no apostles who could follow Jesus Christ and, since Christianity began, how many disciples and later how many religious who have sanctified themselves in the practice of the evangelical counsels would have been lost for ever with their mothers? There lies a palpable truth which I need not elaborate. To sum up, for I must finish this letter which I did not intend to be so long when I took up my pen, after yielding to a scarcely credible impulse and making up your own mind about it, then coming a little to your senses again and realizing your fault, overpowered somewhat as you are by the obvious truth, you make the admissions I have recalled to you above and add still another: “you foresee that in the world you will be out of your element” and, besides laying before me motives that you think have some weight, you beg me to decide what you should do while promising to submit yourself entirely to anything I will judge helpful to your salvation, remarking withal that only my reply, whatever it may be, can get you out of the predicament in which you find yourself. This reply is easy and difficult at the same time. Easy, if I ought to decide in your interests, for your individual good, considering only your salvation; easy if also I could totally abstract from all the ties which bind me to you, from the zeal I have exerted in seeking your sanctification ever since you took me as the director of your conscience, and if I could pronounce only on the facts inasmuch as your salvation is concerned. On the one hand, I would not hesitate to decide that you should promptly do penance for your fault, ask pardon for the scandal that you have given and beg on both knees to be received once more into the shelter that Providence has provided for your weakness, resolved to accept all that can be a means for you to repair the evil you have done. On the other hand, I should judge that an individual capable of letting himself go so far, culpable of such an enormous fault which perhaps is only the consequence of an innumerable crowd of other faults and ceaseless infidelities is unworthy to be admitted into a Society he knew not how to appreciate and whose peace he would disturb with new vagaries. But as I cannot entirely divest myself of the feelings with which God inspired me in your regard when I took over your direction, and as it is painful for me to rule for an exclusion which would have such grim results for you, I will decide nothing from here and will refrain from making up my mind until I am on the spot. In the mean- time, live under the obedience of M. Tempier and follow exactly what- ever he prescribes for you. For my part, I will pray God for you that, through the intercession of all the saints of whom I am reminded here, those especially who grasped better than you the words of life contained in the evangelical counsels, followed them with great generosity and inculcated them in countless others, you may return to your better self, cease to obstruct God’s plans for you and give proofs of your repentance and perseverance in doing what is right. May I be able on my return to ensure your true happiness without compromising the honour and tranquillity of the Society to which God has just given, this very evening, the greatest proof of protection that we can hope for on earth. Your letter forsooth had to dampen my rightful joy with a bitter sorrow that you certainly ought to have spared me.
Adieu.

Roman Diary

Oblate Writings XVII

Roman Diary 1825-1826

Rome

February 18, 1826
18: For a long time I have wanted to offer the holy sacrifice in the room where Saint Stanislas Kostka⁶⁷ died, all the more so since Saint Sylvester’s where I am living is only a stone’s throw from Saint Andrew’s, the Jesuit noviciate, where Saint Stanislas lived and went on to a better life. Since I did not want to leave this area this morning so as to be on time at Archbishop Marchetti’s, who lives at the Quirinal directly opposite the noviciate, I decided to make my short pilgrimage. I rang lightly at the door; a Brother immediately came to welcome me. After asking the purpose of my visit, he led me to the parlour where I waited while he took my calling card to the rector. There were books on the table for interested visitors which seemed to encourage them not to waste their time; I took up the first one at hand, it was the Rule of the Society, probably put out as an attraction to men of good will.
The directions were given while I was reading to satisfy my devotion. The Brother came to get me and went with me to the chapel door where I found everything laid out: two sacristans to serve me, candles lit, and a third novice, a French priest, to do the honours of the house. They had recognized from my dress that I was French; besides that, I had announced myself. The Father Superior, who is novice-master at the same time, had seen to everything without having to be disturbed himself. However, since I was hoping to meet him, after I had prayed a moment in front of the saint’s statue, placed precisely where his bed had been, I asked the French priest-novice if it would be improper to request to see the Father Superior; he assured me of the contrary, and immediately went to let him know of my desire to meet him. We went up to his room together and I was pleased with both his welcome and himself. After talking with him for a quarter of an hour, I left him, promising myself that I would come back to visit him again before leaving Rome. Returning to the chapel, I said holy mass on the altar placed appropriately on the very spot that the saint had had himself laid on the floor and where he died. After making my thanksgiving, when I went back into the sacristy to get my coat, the priest novice presented me on a plate a small book containing the saint’s life and an image of him, and the two novice sacristans at the chapel promptly took it upon themselves to show me all the relics and explain all the paintings in the various small cells, which used to be the infirmary and are now made over into chapels. I greatly thanked them for their kindness, recommended myself to their prayers and, once more following the French novice, I visited with him a part of the house and the gardens, without naturally going into that part where the three kinds of novices live in that house, that is, priests, clerical students, and brothers who have no communication among themselves. At present, there are seven priests in the noviciate; I did not ask how many clerics there were, but I know they are a rather large number, which is not surprising since the Roman noviciate accepts novices from every country to supply, I imagine, the Roman College, after they have made their vows. The priest novice whom the Father Superior had had the good inspiration to offer me to serve as a guide was, as I have said, French and had come to Rome on the same ship as the Abbé Julien Giraud, the enlightened Gérard and his simple-minded companion.
As I left Saint Andrew’s, I went into the Quirinal palace where Archbishop Marchetti gave me that good news that last night the Pope had approved and confirmed the decision of the Congregation regarding our matter. Te Deum laudamus. Per singulos dies benedicimus te, et laudamus nomen tuum in saeculum saeculi.

To Fr. Tempier at Marseilles.⁶⁸

226:VII in Oblate Writings

Pope Leo XII has approved the rules. Gratitude and praise to God. New obligation of holiness and zeal Will have to spend days recopying the Rules. Hopes to obtain the brief soon and to leave after Easter. Letter to Bro. Riccardi. Defections in all religious Orders.
L.J.C.
Tempier

Rome,

February 18, 1826.
Te Deum laudamus, te Dominum confitemur. Te per orbem terrarum sancta confitetur ecclesia. Per singulos dies benedicimus te et laudamus nomen tuum in saeculum, et in saeculum seculi.
My dear friend, my dear brothers, on February 17, 1826, yesterday evening, the Sovereign Pontiff Leo XII confirmed the decision of the congregation of Cardinals and specifically approved the Institute, the Rules and Constitutions of the Missionary Oblates of the Most Holy and Immaculate Virgin Mary, and accompanied this solemn act of his pontifical power, with most admiring words for those who happily form this Society from which the head of the Church indeed expects the greatest good.
Everyone is stupefied at this. Even those called upon to contribute with their votes to the execution of the very emphatic will of the Pope, are surprised by the unanimous agreement of views and especially with the imperturbable resolution of the Holy Father, whom nothing has been able to deter from the first thought with which the Holy Spirit inspired him on the first day that I knelt at his feet and presented to him the plan of this enterprise which now we can call divine. The Pope knew everything and weighed everything in his profound wisdom. We have not here the decisions the view, the approbation of a certain few, of certain Prelates: we have the decisions the view, the approbation of the Head of the Church who has not depended on the judgement of others, even that of the congregation of Cardinals to which he entrusted the matter for examination, but who has pronounced himself on the facts presented, with full and entire cognisance thereof. I need not tell you that he was not delayed an instant by the fine protestations brought to his attention. They will have left him with no great opinion of the one whose sorry idea it was to make them, for they impugned his sovereign jurisdiction, as he well remarked, since it would devolve therefrom that no Pope could ever have been right in approving in the Church religious Orders or regular Congregations which all are exempt, as to their interior rule and their members as well, from ordinary jurisdictions.
The brief which is going to be delivered to us will also be, in a way, the work of the Holy Father in the sense that he himself decided on several things to be inserted in it, and notably the prior approbation of the Bishops which is much to our liking: indeed one whom you well know will no doubt be flattered enough to refrain from alluding to the other signature, extorted to be sure, but which gives him scant honour when compared with the pompous approbation written entirely in his own hand.
But let us leave these reflections aside so as to stop and consider only the infinite goodness of God and the designs of his Providence on our behalf. Do you realise that nothing ever has been seen so astonishing as this? Those whose duty it is to deal with such matters are the first to make this remark and to be all the more surprised with the happy outcome of the steps we took, all of them inspired, directed, blessed by God, inasmuch as the policy was no longer to do anything of the sort and I, being right here engaged in my quest with the aid of the Master of all hearts, have seen several others come to grief and not obtain what they sought. The conclusion to be drawn from this, my dear friends and good brothers, is: we must work, with renewed ardour and still more total devotedness, to bring to God all the glory that stems from our efforts and, to the needy souls of our neighbours, salvation in all possible ways; we must attach ourselves heart and soul to our Rules and practice [more] exactly what they prescribe to us. To do this well, would mean remaking our novitiate so as to meditate at leisure on all they contain. They are not a bagatelle, they are no longer simple regulations, merely pious directions; they are Rules approved by the Church after most minute examination. They have been judged holy and eminently suited to lead those who have embraced them to their goal. They have become the property of the Church that has adopted them. The Pope, by approving them, has become their guarantor. He whom God has used to draw them up disappears; it is certain today that he was merely the mechanical instrument which the Spirit of God put into play in order to show the path he wanted to be followed by those whom he had predestined and preordained for the work of his mercy, in calling them to form and maintain our poor, little and modest Society. Somewhat puny as we are, being weak and few in number, we nonetheless have an existence in the Church no less than that of the most celebrated bodies, the most holy societies. It is thus we are constituted. Just now I can say to you quietly what I will say to you out loud when the brief is delivered: know your dignity, take care never to dishonour your Mother who has just been enthroned and recognized as Queen in the household of the Spouse, whose grace will make her fecund enough to engender a great number of children, if we are faithful and do not draw upon her a shameful sterility by our prevarications. In the name of God, let us be saints.
Speak only to our own about the success of our cause and to my uncle, of course, as well as to Cailhol,⁶⁹ whom I regard always as one of the family; let him not be perturbed if he reads these words: it is because of the tender affection that I have for him and the sentiments that I know he has for all the members of the Society. But I think that we must wait for the brief to be sent before we hold forth without restraint about the mercies of the Lord for our dear little Society.
The brief will only be expedited after I shall have terminated a large work. I have to copy the entire volume of the Rules and Constitutions, because it is this copy which will be endorsed and put back into my hands. The original, to which are appended the approbations of the Bishops and the signature of the members of the Society, must remain in the archives of the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars. I am somewhat dismayed by this task; I had first had the thought of doing it myself but I fear not to be able to go quickly enough, often being obliged to go off on unavoidable errands. Until now these goings to and fro have taken all my time, and I tell you, in passing, that it is impossible for me to undertake a continuous task like that which you propose to me, either for the history of beginnings of the Society or for the novitiate. I am going today to get in touch with a copyist in order that he will start to work tomorrow, Monday, and that I may be able to present the manuscript at the latest next week. If he does not promise me to finish in a week, I will sacrifice everything and shut myself up in order to do this work myself, keeping at it day and night. If I dared to unbind the volume, I could take on several copyists. I will consider that in a little while and if I can do it without inconvenience, I will adopt this choice which will shorten the time of waiting, and avoid the inconvenience of the delays which are annoying in all matters, but still more in those of a nature like ours. Now I begin to hope to be able to leave immediately after Easter, unless the procedure with the brief is drawn out at length. I lull myself into thinking the contrary for I find that it is indeed a long time since I am separated from you and the family; but I feel that it had to be so and the good God has chosen me to render this service to the Society; and I ought to offer thanksgiving to him for whom we work, for having so well disposed hearts in my favour, that each of those with whom I had to deal advanced to meet me half-way, were favourable to begin with and found good in all I proposed, as if the Lord revealed to them the sentiments of my soul and let them perceive from within that my sole ambition is to please God and procure his glory by serving the Church and saving souls. I must add, that from the facts I presented and all that the weight of the truth obliged me to say, they conceived, the Pope especially, a very favourable idea of the whole Society, which ought to stimulate us to deserve more and more, by our devotedness to all good, a protection so high and so honourable. Amen.
I have written a long letter to [Riccardi]; I am sending it to you because I want you to have it copied before giving it to him. I think it as well that one should know in future what I think of these harlequins, who have as much of the motley in their soul as these fine citizens of Bergamo have in their costumes. Do not be surprised at so many defections. There were countless such in the time of the blessed Alphonse in his Congregation and after his death, it had gone so far that quite a number of candidates entered the Society to be ordained without a patrimony and said farewell to the company as soon as they were priests. They were obliged to take the precaution of having them sign a document whereby they were obliged, if they left the Society before ten years, to defray the expenses they had incurred. Amongst the Lazarists, one fine day, eight students, that is to say, amongst those who had made their vows and completed their courses of philosophy and theology, decided amongst themselves to go and become Dominicans. The event perhaps had less of an effect on them, because they were more numerous, but this misfortune nonetheless happened to them as to us. Who could count the secularisations and even the apostasies in the religious Orders? Poor human race, how few the men you number!
Adieu, very dear friend, I wanted to sign today in style but I have only enough space to embrace you as well as the whole family.