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Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

Rome, 19 September 2016

FEAST OF SAINT VINCENT DE PAUL


Dear members of the Vincentian Family,
May the grace and peace of Jesus be always with us!
It is with great joy and thankfulness to each of you, who are serving our lords and
masters all around the world, that I address this letter to you for the first time as Superior
General. I would like to express my deep gratitude and admiration to all of you living and
serving even in the farthest corners of the globe as witnesses to Jesus love! We are all
servants and it is wonderful to know that in this service we are never alone. It is Jesus, our
Mother Mary, Saint Vincent de Paul, Saint Louise de Marillac, and all the other blessed
and saints of the Vincentian Family who accompany us on the journey.
Let me take this moment to thank profoundly Father Gregory Gay, CM, our
Superior General for the last 12 years, as well as all the other members and leaders of the
Vincentian Family on the international, national, and local levels, who have so tirelessly
and with so much enthusiasm and dedication served in the past years to make possible
the affective and effective proclamation of the Good News to the Poor.
I also would like to use this opportunity to thank so very much all of you, members
of the different branches of the Vincentian Family, who had written to me after my
election as Superior General and expressed so wholeheartedly your good wishes and, in
a special way, your promise of regular prayer. As it will not be possible for me to respond
and thank each one of you individually, be assured that you are included personally in
these words of thankfulness, as I extend to each of you my promise of daily
remembrance in prayer.
It is a moment of special grace that Providence is offering us in the upcoming
Anniversary (1617-2017) of our common Vincentian Spirituality and Charism. Many
of you already have begun intensive planning to share and encourage others to follow
our Vincentian spirituality and charism on the local, national, and international levels. I
encourage all of us to keep reflecting, planning, and acting together as how best to share
with others this special moment of grace.
400th

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Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

The motto of the whole Vincentian Family for 2017 that is going to shed light on it
all is: I was a stranger and you welcomed me (Matthew 25:35). As our sight is
directed toward our brothers and sisters, especially the most abandoned and those for
whom no one cares, in order to be sure that our reflecting, planning, and acting go in the
right direction, the path always needs to begin with us. The Feast of Saint Vincent de Paul
gives us a renewed opportunity to reflect on the reasons and ways of Vincents reflecting,
planning, and acting.
The theologian Karl Rahner, at the end of the 20th century, had pronounced these
prophetic words: The Christians of the 21st century are going to be mystics, or they will
not be. Why can we call Saint Vincent de Paul a Mystic of Charity?
I would like to invite and encourage each of us, individually and as a group, to
reflect, plan, and act on the following point:

Why and how can I describe Vincent as a Mystic of Charity?


I asked three of our confreres, who had reflected and written on this subject in the
past, to share a short personal reflection. May these thoughts help us to renew and
deepen our own reflections.

1) Father Hugh ODonnell, CM


We all know Vincent was a man of action, so we may be surprised to hear him also
referred to as a mystic. But in fact it was his mystical experience of the Trinity and in
particular the Incarnation that was the font of all his actions in favor of poor
people. Henri Brmond, the distinguished historian of French spirituality, was the
first to bring it to our attention. He said, it is (Vincents) mysticism which gave us
the greatest of the men of action. Andr Dodin and Jos Mara Ibaez later called
Vincent a mystic of action and Giuseppe Toscani, CM, united mysticism and
action and came to the heart of the matter in calling him a mystic of Charity.
Vincent lived in a century of mystics, but he stood out as the Mystic of Charity.
Being a mystic implies experience, the experience of Mystery. For Vincent it meant
a deep experience of the Mystery of Gods Love. We know that the Mysteries of
the Trinity and the Incarnation were at the heart of his life. The experience of the
Trinitys inclusive love of the world and the Incarnate Words unconditional
embrace of every human person shaped, conditioned, and fired his love of the
world and everyone in it, in particular, sisters and brothers in need. He looked

500 East Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19144, USA


+1 (215) 715-3984
@: VFO@famvin.org
WWW: famvin.org

Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

upon the world with the eyes of Abba and Jesus and embraced everyone with the
unconditional love, warmth and energy of the Holy Spirit.
Vincents mysticism was the source of his apostolic action. The Mystery of Gods
love and the Mystery of the Poor were the two poles of Vincents dynamic love. But
Vincents Way had a third dimension, which was how he regarded time. Time was
the medium through which the Providence of God made itself known to him. He
acted according to Gods time, not his own. Do the good that presents itself to be
done, he advised. Do not tread on the heels of Providence.
Another aspect of time for Vincent was the presence of God here and now God
is here! (influence of Ruysbroek). God is here in time. God is here in persons, in
events, in circumstances, in poor people. God speaks to us now in and through
them. Vincent was a man of unfolding history in the deepest sense. He followed
the lead of Providence step by step. He had neither an ego-agenda nor an
ideology. It took him decades to arrive at such interior freedom, which is why
Vincents journey to holiness and freedom (1600-1625) is the key to understanding
the daily dynamic of the Apostle of Charity.

2) Father Robert Maloney, CM


When we speak of mystics, we usually think of people who have extraordinary
religious experiences. Their quest for God moves from active search to passive
presence. They pray, as Saint Paul says to the church in Rome (8:26), with sighs
and groans too deep for human words. Mystics have ecstatic moments when they
are completely lost in God, whether in the body or out of the body, I do not
know, as Saint Paul recounts his experience in 2 Corinthians 12:3. At times, they
have visions and receive private revelations. They attempt, with difficulty, to
describe for others their moments of intense light and painful darkness. Saint
Vincent knew the writings of mystics like Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross.
Though generally cautious about unusual spiritual phenomena, he admired
Madame Acarie, one of the renowned mystics of his day, who lived in Paris during
his early years there.
Vincents brand of mysticism was strikingly different. He found God in the people
and events around him. His visions were deeply Christological. He saw Christ in
the face of the poor. To use a phrase from the Jesuit tradition that has become
popular in Vincentian documents, he was a contemplative in action. Christ led
him to the poor and the poor led him to Christ. When he spoke of the poor and
when he spoke of Christ, his words were often ecstatic. He told his priests and
500 East Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19144, USA
+1 (215) 715-3984
@: VFO@famvin.org
WWW: famvin.org

Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

brothers: If we ask Our Lord, What did you come to do on earth? he answers, To
assist the poor. Anything else? To assist the poor. So, are we not very fortunate to
belong to the Mission for the same purpose that caused God to become man?
And if someone were to question a Missioner, wouldnt it be a great honor for him
to be able to say with Our Lord, He sent me to preach the good news to the poor
(CCD:XI:98). When he spoke about Christ, he could be rapturous. In 1655, he cried
out, Let us ask God to give the Company this spirit, this heart, this heart that
causes us to go everywhere, this heart of the Son of God, the heart of Our Lord,
the heart of Our Lord, the heart of Our Lord, that disposes us to go as He went
He sends us, like the apostles, to bring fire everywhere, to bring this divine fire, this
fire of love (CCD:XI:264).
For Vincent, the horizontal and the vertical dimensions of spirituality were both
indispensable. He saw love of Christ and love of the poor as inseparable. Again
and again, he urged his followers not just to act but also to pray, and not just to
pray but also to act. He heard an objection from his followers: But there are so
many things to do, so many house duties, so many ministries in town and country;
theres work everywhere; must we, then, leave all that to think only of God? And
he responded forcefully: No, but we have to sanctify those activities by seeking
God in them, and do them in order to find Him in them rather than to see that they
get done. Our Lord wills that we seek above all His glory, His kingdom, and His
justice, and, to do this, we make our primary concern the interior life, faith, trust,
love, our spiritual exercises, meditation, shame, humiliations, our work and
troubles, in the sight of God our Sovereign Lord. Once were grounded in seeking
Gods glory in this way, we can be assured that the rest will follow (CCD:XII:111).
In a ground-breaking 11-volume work written almost a century ago, Henri
Brmond described Saint Vincents era as the time of The Mystical Conquest. At
the conclusion of an eloquent chapter about Vincent, he stated: It was mysticism
that gave us the greatest of our men of works (Histoire littraire du sentiment
religieux en France, III La Conqute Mystique (Paris, 1921), p. 257).

3) Father Thomas McKenna, CM


For this title to serve well, the word mystic has to be understood in its most
general sense. The more popular connotation is that of a person who has more or
less direct experience of God (visions, voices, leanings, sounds), more
unmediated than not. The literature of mysticism describes experiences like
ecstasies, being taken up into a third heaven, taken out of oneself and sinking
into the Mystery (e.g., into the Abyss, Ocean, Ground) who is God. Its vocabulary
500 East Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19144, USA
+1 (215) 715-3984
@: VFO@famvin.org
WWW: famvin.org

Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

is distinctive; e.g., progressively deeper inner mansions, active and passive


contemplation, purgative/illuminative/unitive stages, passing beyond oneself, dark
nights and dazzling darkness. By contrast, Vincents language for religious
experience was quite simple and direct, and neither did he testify to these kinds of
occurrences in his own life.
But the word mystic can be applied in a wider sense. That is to say, it might refer to
someone who has a lived and felt contact with the sacred in life, and who responds
to that encounter in service to the neighbor. Under this broader meaning, Vincent
can be thought of as a mystic.
The more inclusive sense might be something like this. A mystic is one who listens
to and gets caught up into Gods love for creation, and who then commits himself
both to recognizing that love in the world and also bringing it there. For Vincent,
this love (better, loving) of God revealed itself especially in people who were
poor and marginalized. He came to recognize them both as privileged bearers of
Gods love and as particularly deserving recipients of it. And he followed up on
this by actively bringing the Good News of that love to those poor ones.
Much like the way the right lyrics can draw out the deeper beauty of a melody, the
words from Isaiah that Jesus spoke in Luke chapter 4 gave a particularly resonant
expression to Vincents experience of God. Here was Jesus announcing not only
His own mission from His Father, but also His own experience of His Abba as Love
for the world, especially for the downcast: I have been sent to bring the Good
News to the poor. To paraphrase, The fire of my Fathers love (loving) is burning
within me, and it drives me to bring just that love to the world, most especially to
the poor ones in it. To follow the analogy, Vincent recognized these words as the
lyrics to a melody that had been playing deeper and deeper within him. It was as if
on hearing this text at a particular juncture in his life, Vincent said something like
Aha! Thats it! Those words catch just how Im experiencing Gods love and just
how I want to spend my life in responding and spreading it.
Another angle. You might describe Vincent as a bi-spectacled mystic. That is to
say, he was (seeing) experiencing the same God through two different lenses, both
at much the same time. One lens was his own prayer; the other was the person
who was poor as well as the world he or she lived in. Each angle of view influenced
the other, the one deepening and sharpening the perception of its opposite.
Vincent saw (and felt) Gods love through both these perspectives at the same
time and acted vigorously to respond to what he was seeing.

500 East Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19144, USA


+1 (215) 715-3984
@: VFO@famvin.org
WWW: famvin.org

Vincentian Family Office Bureau de la Famillie Vincentienne Oficina de la Familia Vicenciana

To keep our reflecting, planning, and acting in the right direction as members of
the Vincentian Family, to help us reflect on Vincent as a Mystic of Charity, the many
Congregations that are part of the Vincentian Family or will become part in the future
have their own Constitutions as the first and most important source, and all the branches
as a whole have the writings and conferences of Saint Vincent de Paul, as well as the
writings and conferences of other blessed and saints of the Vincentian Family. May the
reading and praying of these texts be part of our daily commitments.
As we approach the Feast of Saint Vincent de Paul that we will celebrate with the
whole Vincentian Family, as well as with many other people, groups, and organizations
whom we touch and serve, may we be deeply encouraged by this moment of special
grace that Providence is putting in front of us, the birth 400 years ago of our common
spirituality and charism.
I wish each of us a wonderful celebration, as we continue our prayers for one another!

Your brother in Saint Vincent,

Toma Mavri, CM
Superior General

500 East Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19144, USA


+1 (215) 715-3984
@: VFO@famvin.org
WWW: famvin.org

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