Posted on 08/19/2002 5:58:00 PM PDT by Lady In Blue
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St. John Eudes
Feast Day August 19
John was born in 1601 of good, devout parents at the village of Ri in the diocese of Seez. While yet a boy, when he was refreshed with the Bread of Angels, he vowed perpetual virginity. In the schools, where he pursued his studies in a praiseworthy way, he shone for his wonderful piety. He loved the Blessed Virgin above all, and burned with great charity for his neighbor. Having joined the Berullian Congregation of the Oratory, he was ordained priest at Paris. He was made rector of the house of the Oratory at Caen, but left it, although sadly, to educate suitable young men for the ministry of the Church. To this end, with five companions, he founded the congregation of priests to which he gave the most holy Names of Jesus and Mary, and opened the first seminary at Caen, which was followed later by many others. In order to call sinful women back to a Christian life, he founded the Order of Our Lady of Charity. Of this noble tree, the Congregation of the Good Shepherd of Angers is a branch. He also founded the Society of the Admirable Heart of the Mother of God and other charitable institutions. Burning with a singular love for the most sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, he was the first to think—not without some inspiration from God—of offering them a liturgical cult. As an Apostolic Missionary, he preached the Gospel to many villages and towns. Worn out with his great labors, he died peacefully on the 19th of August, 1680. Famous for many miracles, he was numbered among the Blessed by Pope Pius X, and among the Saints by Pope Pius XI on the day of Pentecost in the holy year, and his Office and Mass were extended to the universal Church.
(From Matins of the feast of St. John Eudes) |
But of all his activities the one that has perhaps had the most widespread influence in the church as a whole is his foundation of the public devotion to the Sacred Heart, an achievement which until the early years of this century was attributed principally to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, the Visitation and the Society of Jesus. The obscurity which for more than two centuries surrounded Eudes's priority in this field is attributed by Bremond in his magistral Histoire litteraire du sentiment religieux en France to the nefarious activities of the Jansenists, whose hostility Eudes incurred by his steadfast opposition to their harsh and narrow conception of a Christ who dies only for a small number of predestined elect. The Eudists as a whole were never tainted with Jansenism and did much to combat its influence. Eudes composed the mass and office of the Sacred Heart in 1668-9, and a feast of the Sacred Heart was first celebrated by Eudist communities on October 20th, 1672; the first of St. Margaret Mary's revelations at Paray did not occur until December 27th, 1673, and the mass said in the Dijon Visitandines' chapel at their first public celebration of the Sacred Heart is clearly based on Eudes's mass. In the Beatification decree Pius X declared that John Eudes must be regarded as the father, doctor and apostle of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of its precursor, the devotion to the heart of Mary (Eudists celebrated a feast of the Holy Heart of Mary as early as 1648). The devotions founded by St. John Eudes and St. Margaret Mary have since merged into one, but it is possible to discern at the beginning differences of emphasis; for example, by `the love of Jesus' Eudes understands above all the love of Jesus for his Father, while the Paray devotion was concerned primarily with the love of Jesus for men.
Bérulle tried to give theocentric mysticism a specifically Catholic color by making it Christocentric; his disciple Eudes moves one step further on, from contemplation of the person of Jesus as a whole to contemplation of the ultimate source of love in that person: the heart. All Eudes' ideas are already present in his Royaume de Jésus (1637). His vernacular style (he wrote several devotional works) tends to be rhetorical and diffuse; his best writing is to be found in the Latin of his office of the Sacred Heart. He died on August 19th, 1680, was beatified in 1909 and canonized in 1925.
Courtesy of Catholic Information Network (CIN) Sponsored by St. Gabriel Gift & Book Nook 08/09/2000
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John Eudes was born at Ri, Normandy, France, on November 14, 1601, the son of a farmer. He went to the Jesuit college at Caen when he was 14, and despite his parents' wish that he marry, joined the Congregation of the Oratory of France in 1623. He studied at Paris and at Aubervilliers, was ordained in 1625, and worked as a volunteer, caring for the victims of the plagues that struck Normandy in 1625 and 1631, and spent the next decade giving Missions, building a reputation as an outstanding preacher and confessor and for his opposition to Jansenism. He became interested in helping fallen women, and in 1641, with Madeleine Lamy, founded a refuge for them in Caen under the direction of the Visitandines. He resigned from the Oratorians in 1643 and founded the Congregation of Jesus and Mary (the Eudists) at Caen, composed of secular priests not bound by vows but dedicated to upgrading the clergy by establishing effective seminaries and to preaching missions. His foundation was opposed by the Oratorians and the Jansenists, and he was unable to obtain Papal approval for it, but in 1650, the Bishop of Coutances invited him to establish a seminary in that diocese. The same year the sisters at his refuge in Caen left the Visitandines and were recognized by the Bishop of Bayeux as a new congregation under the name of Sisters of Our Lady of Charity of the Refuge. John founded seminaries at Lisieux in 1653 and Rouen in 1659 and was unsuccessful in another attempt to secure Papal approval of his congregation, but in 1666 the Refuge sisters received Pope Alexander III's approval as an institute to reclaim and care for penitent wayward women. John continued giving missions and established new seminaries at Evreux in 1666 and Rennes in 1670. He shared with St. Mary Margaret Alacoque the honor of initiating devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus (he composed the Mass for the Sacred Heart in 1668) and the Holy Heart of Mary, popularizing the devotions with his "The Devotion to the Adorable Heart of Jesus" (1670) and "The Admirable Heart of the Most Holy Mother of God", which he finished a month before his death at Caen on August 19th. He was canonized in 1925. His feast day is August 19th. |
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Amen.
BTTT on 08-19-04
Looks like out pictures disappeared!
BTTT on the Optional Memorial of St. John Eudes, August 19, 2005!
SAINT JOHN EUDES
Founder of the Congregation of Jesus and Mary (Eudists) and the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity
(1601-1680)
Saint John Eudes, forerunner of devotion both to the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, was born in 1601, some time after France had been torn apart by the revolt of the Huguenots. The rebels were calmed but relegated to western France by King Henry IV, after he himself returned to the Catholic faith. It was in that region that this young Saint spent his childhood, at Argentan in Normandy, and was educated with the Jesuits of Caen. The father of this firstborn of a family of solid and profound virtue, had himself desired the sacerdotal life, and he did not long oppose John’s desire to consecrate himself to God as a priest. At eighteen years of age Saint John had already composed a treatise on voluntary abnegation, which his confessor obliged him to publish. He was ordained in Paris as a member of the recently founded French Oratory of Saint Philip Neri; his teachers there were Fathers de Berulle and de Condren, two unsurpassed spiritual directors. The governing theme of his meditation, his preaching and his writings was the importance of the redemptive Incarnation of the Son of God, through the intermediary of His Immaculate Mother. Controversy was not lacking in those days, when the Mother of God had been relegated to a very secondary if not insignificant role by the reformers, and Saint John did not fear controversy. He chose to study both theology and what we would call debate, as essential preparations for his calling. In those days seminaries were scarce; aspiring future priests themselves sought out the instruction they needed.
At Caen a pestilence broke out and soon decimated the populace, often deprived of spiritual assistance. John Eudes offered to care for them in person, and while the scourge lasted slept outdoors in a field, in an old barrel, to protect his brothers in religion from contagion. In 1639 he was named Superior of the Oratory of Caen by Father de Condren, although the Superior General feared that office could interfere with his missions, from which they hoped for great renovation in western France. Nonetheless, from 1638 until 1642, Saint John, with his brethren in religion, was engaged in preaching missions in the dioceses of Bayeux and Lisieux, where the bishops encouraged him and soon were praising him highly. The fruits of these missions were rich and long-lived. Father Eudes was a follower of Saint Vincent de Paul in his ardent desire to evangelize the poor folk, so long neglected, and it was to the people that the preaching of the Oratorian missionaries was addressed. Their missions lasted for several weeks. “Otherwise,” said Saint John, “we put a bandage on the wound, but do not heal it.” Processions, hymns, little religious plays, special conferences for specific groups, organization of leagues against duels and blasphemy, and visits to the sick occupied the missionaries’ very full days.
Saint John Eudes left the Oratory, a Society of priests which he loved sincerely, like other founders who have been in a similar position, because he was called by God to break new ground in establishing a group of priests without religious vows, destined to occupy posts in the new seminaries of France. The Council of Trent had commanded these establishments everywhere, ordaining that priests be formed to head parishes and to establish in each of them a school. Already in 1658 Saint John himself had founded four seminaries in Normandy — at Caen, Coutances, Lisieux and Rouen. Before the Revolution in France, the Eudists had accepted the responsibility for sixteen seminaries or minor seminaries. This required a foundation in depth in theology and all pastoral duties. Some of his former brethren turned against him when he left them, and he met obstacles also when founding in Caen a Congregation of women to raise up poor girls led astray by ignorance or need. The Sisters of Our Lady of Charity founded by Saint John, parent body of the Good Shepherd nuns, have done an immense good in many countries. The Congregation of Jesus and Mary has sent missionary priests to several countries, all over the world. Saint John Eudes, who died in 1680, was beatified in 1909 by Saint Pius X, and canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1925.
Sources: Le Vénérable Père Eudes, by Henri Joly (V. Lecoffre: Paris, 1907); “Saint Jean Eudes,” by Paul Milcent, in Vie Eudiste, quarterly review, No. 8, 1973.
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Feastday: August 19