Quote of the day, 31 January: St. Thérèse & Abbé Bellière

On the evening of Love, speaking without parable,
Jesus said: “If anyone wishes to love me
All his life, let him keep my Word.
My Father and I will come to visit him.
And we will make his heart our dwelling.
Coming to him, we shall love him always.
We want him to remain, filled with peace,
In our Love!…”

Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus

PN 17, Living on Love!, st. 1

The goodness that God has shown me is very touching, and the goodness that He has imparted to you is working deep in my soul, comforted by the attention that your charity inspires in me—I feel myself becoming better each time I experience a little of the piety that you experience in Carmel—and I would like to love Jesus as you love Him there—You had it in your heart, Sister, when you were composing that hymn of love that you so kindly sent me [NP 17, Vivre d’Amour]. You’re inhaling a divine breath that makes you pure and strong. The evening of the day when I had the joy of receiving it, it was the object of a long and sweet meditation, together with my Director, who was so happy to know that my soul and my work were entrusted to your care. 

Oh, yes, Sister, “Let’s live in love.” It is the way to find happiness on earth—Without God, without his Love—it’s cold all around us—But as soon as a holy fervor enlivens our hearts, what serenity and sweetness there is in life—Indeed, it’s like resting on the stormy waves, it’s living the life of the Glorious King, the Delights of the Chosen Ones—to begin on earth the happiness of Heaven—Calvary then becomes Tabor and sorrow is no more—for, as the Holy One says: when we love, there is no more sorrow, or if there’s sorrow, it’s sorrow that we love.

I’m asking the Sacred Heart to give us this love that is ever greater, ever stronger, and ever more generous, and that through it He may so draw us to Himself that we may remain definitively and indissolubly attached to Him.

Forever in his Holy Heart, your miserable brother

M. Barthélemy-Bellière

LC 174, Sunday, 31 January [1897], (excerpts)

Note: St. Thérèse’s poem Vivre d’Amour (Living on Love) was sent to Abbé Maurice Bellière by Mother Marie de Gonzague on January 27 or 28, 1897. In his letter to Thérèse dated January 31, he acknowledged receiving it and shared how deeply it moved him. That same day, in a separate letter to Mother Marie de Gonzague, he expressed gratitude for the poem: “You were right, Mother, it was to do me good, and it is often a sweet joy for me to read it over again. When adapting it to music, I seem to hear a tune from heaven.”

Thérèse of Lisieux, S & Clarke, J 1988, General Correspondence: Letters of Saint Therese of Lisieux: Volume 2 1890-1897. Centenary ed., Institute of Carmelite Studies, Washington DC.

Thérèse of Lisieux, S & Kinney, D 1995, The Poetry of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, ICS Publications, Washington DC.

Featured image: Abbé Maurice Barthélémy-Bellière is seen in this undated photo, wearing the habit of the Pères Blancs (White Fathers), formally known as the Missionaries of Africa. Adobe Express creates a collage of images of Bellière and St. Thérèse, featured with a background image of zebras grazing in Malawi, where Bellière served in the missions.

#AbbéBellière #love #MauriceBellière #MissionariesOfAfrica #poetry #seminarian #StThereseOfLisieux #WhiteFathers

Divine Jesus, listen to the prayer I offer for the one who desires to be Your missionary. Keep him safe amidst the dangers of the world. Help him to increasingly feel the nothingness and vanity of passing things and the joy of disregarding them for love of You. May his noble apostolate already begin with those around him, and may he be an apostle worthy of Your Sacred Heart…

St. Thérèse of Lisieux
Prayer 8 for Abbé Bellière

How good God is, Mother, and how I admire, while giving thanks, His wonderful and merciful Providence that has done such great things for me! After Him, I thank you, Mother, for your immense charity toward me, I who deserved it less than anyone. This can only be found in souls filled with God. Now I am no longer afraid, and I feel a new fervor in my heart that will triumph. I will be a saint; I want to be a saint. Besides, to be a priest, especially a missionary, is to be a saint—and if I say saint, why not say martyr? What an ideal, Mother! Priest, apostle, and martyr! But how many graces, virtues, and holiness are required to deserve such a favor. And I have so little of these qualities—but I will attain them—my sister and I will storm heaven, and the sweet Queen of Apostles and Martyrs will welcome me into her elite battalion. And I will owe it to you, Mother, for graciously responding to my desperate plea. Thank you—I cannot express my thanks adequately. At least know that it comes from my grateful heart.

Who have you given me as a sister? A saint, an angel, as you yourself said! I knew there were only saints among you, but I never imagined that a saint among saints would become my sister.

Oh, Mother, you treat me like a son; allow me to see myself as such, and to come to your family to share my sorrows and joys. Let me write to you or visit to share all that happens in my life, whether happy or sad. Let me speak with you about God and draw strength and virtue from you, with all the simplicity of a child—what the world might call a “spoiled child.”

I would also like to tell Sister Thérèse of the Child Jesus how deeply her charity and dedication, drawn from the purest source of divine Love, have touched me. Since the rules of your congregation likely do not allow me to tell her directly, I ask you, Mother, to act as my interpreter with her, as you have done so successfully before. Please tell her how moved I was in thanking Divine Goodness for having chosen her as my sister to help me in the work of Jesus Christ. I read with deep emotion the inspired prayer she composed for me and prays each day. I also ask you to give her this Sacred Heart seal, which symbolizes our divine bond. It only needs her signature now, since you, Mother, and God have already signed it.

Tell Sister Thérèse that my promise remains and will last for eternity, for in heaven, for us priests, it will be like an eternal Mass. She will always be included in my memento, as will you, Mother, and your community. From now on, I will dedicate a decade of the rosary to her each day, and I will offer a communion every month, usually on the first Friday or Sunday. For October, I will offer this communion on Sunday, on the feast of the Holy Heart of Mary, our seminary’s patronal feast. Please ask her to join me in this. It is in the Eucharist that I will give thanks for her prayers and sacrifices, offered in selflessness for my sake. But her greatest desire will be fulfilled: I will be a priest, an apostle after God’s own heart, I feel it. Together, we will save the dear souls of Christ Jesus. What a glorious procession when she enters heaven, and for all eternity.

I do not deceive myself; the good I accomplish will be thanks to her. Just as St. Francis Xavier said that most of the souls redeemed by his zeal owed their salvation to the prayers of the Carmelites, so will it be for me.

I will be merely the instrument, and you, my sister, will be the one converting souls, so that during this difficult year in the military, I may work for God and not return empty-handed, but with souls brought back to the true light. May the cares of the world no longer burden my heart, and may I return to Mary as pure as the angels in heaven, full of divine love and zeal for souls. Let God take care of the rest.

Goodbye, Mother. Goodbye, my sister. Let us meet always in the Sacred Hearts. Thank you also for the golden Ave Maria.

Your respectful and forever grateful son and brother,

M. Barthélemy-Bellière
Child of Mary and Joseph
Honor Guard of the Sacred Heart
Missionary Aspirant

Abbé Maurice Bellière

Letter to Mother Agnès of Jesus
From the diocesan major seminary, Sommervieu (Calvados)
23 October 1895

Note: The French government’s Ministry of Culture has several photos of the former major seminary in Sommervieu, which trained countless priests for the Diocese of Bayeux.

Translation from the French text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Copyright Natalie Ewert (All rights reserved), used by permission.

https://carmelitequotes.blog/2024/10/22/belliere-23oc95/

#AbbéMauriceBellière #gratitude #missionary #prayer #sacrifice #seminarian #StThérèseOfLisieux #vocation

My soul loves to unite with yours in one single prayer for the Church, for the diocese. Since Our Lord dwells in our souls, His prayer belongs to us, and I wish to live in communion with it unceasingly, keeping myself like a little vase at the Source, at the Fountain of life [Rev 7:17; 21:6], so that later I can communicate it to souls by letting its floods of infinite charity overflow [cf. St. Thérèse of Lisieux, Prayer 6].

“I sanctify myself for them that they also may be sanctified in the truth” [Jn 17:19].

Let us make these words of our adored Master all our own, yes, let us sanctify ourselves for souls, and since we are all members of one body [Cf. Eph 4:25 and 5:30; Rom 12:4–5 and especially 1 Cor 12], inasmuch as we have an abundance of divine life, we can communicate it in the great body of the Church.

There are two words that sum up for me all holiness, all apostolate: “Union and Love.” Ask that I may live that fully, and, for that purpose, dwell completely hidden away in the Holy Trinity; you could not wish anything more beautiful for me! [as a gift for the New Year and the first anniversary of Elizabeth’s profession].

A Dieu, Monsieur l’Abbé, I am praying very much for you so that, on the day of your subdiaconate [6 January 1905], God will find your soul just as He wishes it to be.

Let us unite to make Him forget everything by the strength of our love, and let us be, as Saint Paul says, “the praise of His glory.”

Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity

Letter 191 to Abbé André Chevignard (excerpt)
25 January 1904

Note: Elizabeth refers to prayers for the diocese. Biographer and editor Conrad de Meester, O.C.D. indicates that the Dijon diocese was “torn by the personality of its bishop,” Albert-Léon-Marie Le Nordez, who was “suspected of being a member of the Freemasons. The seminary was not very much in favor of him, which led several weeks later to the ‘seminarian’ strike,’ among whom was André Chevignard. Father de Meester also notes that Elizabeth closes this letter with a reference to Eph 1:12, “the praise of his glory.” He indicates that this is “the first appearance of this Pauline phrase in Elizabeth’s writings” and that “very probably Elizabeth had read the expression on a holy card that she had kept since 1901.” As for Bishop Le Nordez, he resigned several months after Elizabeth wrote this letter, on 4 September 1904 at the age of sixty.

Elizabeth of the Trinity, S 2003, The Complete Works of Elizabeth of the Trinity volume 2: Letters from Carmel, translated from the French by Nash, A, ICS Publications, Washington DC.

Featured image: Detail from the banner commissioned for the beatification of Elizabeth of the Trinity, 25 November 1984. Image credit: Discalced Carmelites

https://carmelitequotes.blog/2024/05/25/sabeth-ltr191/

#communion #holiness #LaudemGloriae #love #praiseOfGlory #Sabeth #seminarian #StElizabethOfTheTrinity #union #vocation

"May I see you?
Lift my arms around your neck,
kiss your cheek
and lean into your side?
May I sing a little shanty
of silliest things
into the curve of your ear?"

Tiptoe into the shadows of faith when you still believe but still need to heal from the spiritual abuse inflicted by the church... Poetry from our #seminarian editor-in-chief @ritamockpike

https://www.mockingowlroost.com/blog/poetry-special-1-2024/ - PAGE 10

#poetry #faithpoetry #spiritualabuserecovery #recovery #healing #RitaMockPike #MockingOwlRoost

well, while I figure out how to use this thing may as well make an #introduction and populate some hashtags because reasons.

#classicalmusician #choir #opera #conductor #musiceducator (past life, present hobby)

#episcopalian #episcopalchurch #postulant wannabe #episcopalpriest (god willing/ppl consenting) #progressivechristian #christiansocialist #anglocatholic #smellsandbells #seminarian (current life)

#worldofwarcraft #dragonflight #civilizationv #pokemon #animalcrossing #boardgames (hobby)

I suppose an #introduction is in order--

I'm Sam, my pronouns are they/them. I'm a #trans #episcopal #seminarian at Y*le, and I most recently hail from Southern Arizona.

In my free time, I enjoy drinking good #coffee, reading #QueerTheory and #ScienceFiction, #cooking, and going to the #opera and #symphony.

Academically, I'm interested in #necropolitics, #sacramentology, and nation-state building as well as #ReproductiveFuturism as it relates to #TransRights.

My twitter is @samjchristopher if you followed me over there!

My current (last?) #Twitter profile reads:

#UnitarianUniversalist, #Gay, #Queer, #FaithfullyLGBT. #ReligiousProfessional, #Seminarian. #Christopagan. #Linguaphile. Pers. acct. he/him/his

#Introduction 🧵 #1 (3 toots):

I am a "Uvangelist" #seminarian, sharing #UnitarianUniversalism with all. My passions include #music, #languages, and ethnic #cuisine. I enjoy studying #religions and learning about people's different religious journeys and cultural experiences.

Apparently an #introduction is in order. I'm not a social person so it'll be short. I'm an armchair #historian and #seminarian at Luther Seminary where I'm studying for a MA in History of Christianity. Personal interest is the Great Disappointment and mid-19th century "cults" in America. I enjoy travelling to small riverfront towns on the Mississippi.

I also like #liquor, #woodworking, #tobaccopipes, and #cigars, fwiw.

Hi all, here’s my #introduction:

I am a #gay #Episcopal #seminarian living in #Austin, Texas. I did undergrad at Texas A&M in #philosophy and #classics, and I got mastered by #divinity at #Brite Divinity School. I’m doing my #anglican studies at the #Seminary of the Southwest, after which I hope to be a parish #priest!

Some things I love:
#libraries
#religion
#church
#anglicanism
#liturgies
#pride
#cooking
#🏳️‍🌈
#mixology
#travel
#science
#plants
#history