Spirituality
In the Radiance of Anne Marie Javouhey |
|
|
"May God be glorified! In everything and everywhere may his Holy Will be done!" This was the consuming desire of Anne Marie Javouhey. It was her loving response to God who had chosen, prepared and sent her to live the Gospel and to make known his love throughout the world. Anne Marie Javouhey was the courageous young girl who during the terrors of the French Revolution, guided outlawed priests and catechised the children of neighbouring villages. She was the young woman who, at the call of God, consecrated herself unreservedly to him, always ready to do his Holy Will. She was the tireless apostle who attracted others by her example and who never ceased to proclaim the Good News. In view of the work for which he had destined her, God had bestowed exceptional gifts on her. Anne Marie Javouhey was the strong woman, prompt to act, yet full of wisdom, at once audacious and prudent, enterprising and thoughtful. Her keen mind took note of everything but grasped the essential. As soon as she had decided on her goal, she devised the means to attain it and set to work. For her to know the Will of God and to do it were the same. She was a woman of action and a leader. But she was also a woman of delicate intuition, with an inexhaustible goodness of heart, ready to love and forgive generously. This love, drawn from the heart of Christ which gives sanctuary to every human misery, attracted her towards the ignorant, the poor and the suffering, impelling her to cross the seas in long perilous journeys. She would have liked to be every where at once, never content while there was suffering to be relieved and people to be saved. Through faith she discovered the Divine Will in the signs of the times and the contemporary needs of others, responding to them with boundless generosity. She was at the service of all: children to be educated, neglected sick to be cared for, slaves to be liberated, far-distant peoples to be evangelised.
Open to contemporary thought, she often surpassed it by the daring of her ideas and her creative genius. Convinced that God was demanding more of her than a response to the immediate need, she attacked evil at its root. Respectful of human dignity, she had confidence in everyone. She was the educator who prepared people for the future and tried to establish everywhere a better and more christian social order. True daughter of the Church, she sowed the seed of the young African Churches. She did not act alone. She collaborated fraternally with all those whom God placed in her path and whom she led by the light of her genius. She collaborated too with all those who, inspired by her example, had consecrated themselves totally to the service of Christ. Everywhere, she animated communities where gospel values were lived in preparation for the Kingdom of God. Fortified by contact with God and refined by filial intimacy with Our Blessed Lady, she had unlimited confidence in the wisdom and power of God. She surrendered herself to the Divine Will, source of unity and harmony in her life. Strong in action, serene in contradiction, profoundly peaceful in conflict, she went ahead wholly abandoned to the Spirit who guided her. The Holy Spirit dwelt in her, enlightened her in contemplation, inspired her every action and made her mission fruitful. God made of her "a mother happy among her children". "Her light was not put out in the night ... She lives". She lives because her daughters, from every race and nation and tongue, have but one heart and one soul and continue in the Church the work the Lord entrusted to her. She whom Pius XII beatified on 15th October 1950, has left us this injunction: "May all my dear daughters strive to become saints". |
|
The
Congregation of Saint Joseph of Cluny, founded at the beginning of
the 19th century by Anne Marie Javouhey, developed rapidly and soon
spread throughout the world.
Saint Joseph is its patron. The sisters learn from him to live in intimacy with Jesus and Mary, and to appreciate the nobility and sanctifying value of work. From the beginning, the Institute was consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In union with Christ's love for all, and wishing to spread it throughout the entire world, Anne Marie Javouhey gave her religious family an essentially missionary orientation. As its Foundress wished, Mary is the Superior General of the Congregation. Every year in a gesture of trustful fidelity, the donation is renewed, confiding to her Immaculate Heart all the sisters and their apostolic activities. Saint Teresa teaches the sisters to seek God in all things and to unite contemplation and action. Under her protection and that of Saint Martin, Saint Francis Xavier and Saint Peter Claver, the Congregation pursues its mission in the world, in order that "the whole human race might become one people of God, form one body of Christ, and be built into one temple of the Holy Spirit" (Ad Gentes, 7). The Mother House is the centre of animation and co-ordination, a place of meeting and renewal. It keeps the memory and spirit of the Foundress ever alive and is the sign of unity for all the sisters. |
Spirituality & Mission |
|
To know the Will of God and to do it was the guiding principle of the thought and action of Anne Marie Javouhey, the secret of the serenity and fruitfulness of her life. "To do the Will of God, surely that is everything. We must therefore see it in all things, love to do it and make it loved". It was in the search for and in the accomplishment of this Will that she was united to Christ in everything, and she draws us after her to sound the depths of the mystery of the Word Incarnate. The whole life of Christ reveals that he is the one sent by the Father. His constant preoccupation expressed in his words and acts was to do the Father's Will, to show his filial dependence in everything. His work here below was that which his Father "had given him to do". His love was expressed essentially in an obedience freely offered, an obedience which brought him to death, death on a cross. He rose from the dead for the glory of the Father, so that we might live a new life. United with Christ and in answer to his call, we share in his mission. It is precisely into the heart of this mystery of Christ the Saviour that we are incorporated through fidelity to the missionary spirit which animated Anne Marie Javouhey. Constantly renewing ourselves in total availability to the Holy Spirit, we ask him to guide us and to make us more like Christ.
Convinced that our activity of itself has no apostolic worth, we allow ourselves to be possessed and transformed by Christ, so that through us he may radiate his love for the Father.
Thus from day to day Jesus
Christ takes ever greater possession of us, prays in us and
continues his own life in us. We
share in
his freedom in giving himself, in his joy in proclaiming the
Good News |
|
Thus from day to day Jesus Christ takes ever greater possession of us, prays in us and continues his own life in us. We share in his freedom in giving himself, in his joy in proclaiming the Good News and in his peace in doing the divine Will. We unite with him in his solitude and in the misunderstanding which he endured. We live his poverty and his powerlessness in the face of abuse of freedom and refusal to accept the truth. But a lively faith in the Holy Spirit's influence over everyone, hope of Christ's final victory and love overflowing from his heart help us to have a true missionary spirit. To this special call of God we respond with total availability, ready to leave our country to go where God calls us to serve our sisters and brothers. |
| Available and fraternal, making ourselves "all things to all people", we will know how to adapt to social and cultural conditions in a balanced and courageous manner. In mutual giving and receiving, we will do our best to understand those to whom we are sent, allowing ourselves to be enriched by their authentic values. Thus, God gradually opens up the ways by which he chooses to reveal himself; together we discover that we are children of God through Jesus Christ. |
| "It is God's work we are doing", Anne Marie Javouhey never tired of repeating. The certainty of sharing, through the Congregation, in the Church's vast mission of evangelisation is a powerful stimulus, which makes us more conscious of our responsabilities. With faith in the continuous call of the Holy spirit, every sister feels committed to carry on today the task begun yesterday. |
| Coming from different cultures and backgrounds, we work together, each contributing her talents in a spirit of real collaboration. The thought of our sisters dispersed throughout the world stimulates our apostolic zeal. We remain united across the continents in the same fidelity to God's Will, attentive to discern it in events which he never ceases to direct in such a way that his plan is imprinted on them and made known. |
| Our union with Christ, renewed each day in prayer and the Eucharistic Sacrifice, intensifies our desire to proclaim the Good News. It encourages us to speak as well as to witness by our very presence. In complete fidelity to the doctrine of the Church under the action of the Holy Spirit, we endeavour to transmit the message of salvation in all its vigour and purity, reechoing the teaching of the Word Incarnate and stressing the Father's love for all. |
| By means of our apostolic activities - whether they be proclamation of the Word, education in the faith or preparation of minds and hearts through teaching, nursing, social work or any other form of service - we are always engaged in evangelisation, for the Kingdom of God begun here below grows to the extent that justice, peace and charity are promoted. |
| But our mission is not limited to our apostolic activities; our whole life contributes to it. Our adherence to the Will of God as shown in the observance of our Rule of Life, our fidelity to the demands of our consecration and of our community life, our prayer, our suffering and our death itself, all bear witness to and proclaim Christ the Lord. |
Continue to: Praying with Anne Marie Javouhey |
