Personal Reflection on my Visit to Béziers

What I am sharing now is a personal reflection which came to me while I was at the Mother House. I was one of those privileged to spend some days in Béziers this past June and I am most grateful for the experience especially at this significant time as we celebrate the 200th Anniversary of Father Gailhac's birth.
While in Béziers, I felt a great sense of closeness to Father Gailhac and I wanted to be close to him in the sense of his having such a great love for God. Through our wonder-ful 'tour' guides, we carefully followed in the footsteps of Gailhac and Mère St. Jean and prayed much to be graced with their love and fidelity. Each night, before retiring, I liked to spend time alone in the Crypt, a special 'good night' moment with our beloved Father. Early in the week I had been allowed to touch his heart and so my own heart was touched in a really new way.
In the letter we received from our General Council for the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Mary, there is a quotation from Gailhac's letter of 1878: "From the most tender years of my youth God filled me with his sacred fire, my heart never wanted to live for anything but love.." These words brought back memories to me of my childhood and how much I loved the open peat fire in our home. I loved to feel the warmth of it and especially enjoyed watching the movement of the flames. Every night, as a family, we prayed the rosary, adding all those extra 'trimmings' - prayers, novenas, etc. It was always my task to lead the perpetual novena and litany to the Sacred Heart and so I came to believe that the love of the Heart of Jesus for me was as real as was that of my father and mother.
In Gailhac's letter of November 1880, he writes: 'Jesus, we love you ... make a torrent of flame descend into our hearts from the infinite ocean of flame in your Heart, then we will love you as you wish to be loved.' In another place he says: 'Fire is lighted only with fire ... You are called to love God, so be the fire and the flame.." What a powerful prayer! But, didn't Jesus Himself say: 'I have come to bring fire to the earth and how I wish it were blazing already.'

Marguerite McLoughlin, RSHM
(Western American Province)

Retreat for the Bicentenary of Gailhac

We chose to make our annual retreat at Grace Dieu in Waterford, Ireland in August. Our retreat director was Rev. Donagh O'Shea, O.P. and the theme was the Paschal Mystery. We have not had the mystery so deeply explained and prayed in a long time. When Jesus said to the apostles and the crowd 'Behold we are going up to Jerusalem…' they were bewildered. The procession is moving in the wrong direction - they are moving towards pain. There must be some strange wisdom in the gospel. The body says, move away from danger - they are moving towards danger. The people are stopped in their tracks - bewildered. Jesus walks towards Jerusalem - this inspires us to act today against the easy way, the pleasurable way, to go towards the difficulty. We have to engage our lives with the Paschal Mystery. We have to go towards the difficulty if we want to follow Jesus on his path. So much of our Founder's outlook for the Institute came across in the emphasis made by the retreat director.

Mary Catherine Walsh RSHM
and Catherine Bennett RSHM
(Eastern American Province)