EUROPE/FRANCE - Cardinal Filoni in Lyon: "Pauline-Marie Jaricot, touched by faith, was a torch bearer"

Monday, 27 April 2015

Lyon (Agenzia Fides) - "Pauline-Marie Jaricot, touched by faith, was a torchbearer, who constantly loved transmitting the light she had received". This was stated by Cardinal Fernando Filoni, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, during the conferance which was held on Saturday afternoon, April 25 in Lyon, in Saint-Nizier church, where Pauline Marie Jaricot (1799 -1862) is buried, to mark the official launch of the new website dedicated to her life and apostolic and missionary commitment (see Fides 25/04/2015).
Retracing the earthly events of Pauline Marie Jaricot, "bright star of that era of strong evangelization", the Cardinal revealed among other things that "the originality, or if one also wants to say 'her exceptional ability', her vision is not only in the spiritual renewal initiated between laity and workers, but also in that wide-ranging missionary breath that came from her heart ... She was not interested in founding a religious female or male missionary congregation, but loved to involve the laity by virtue of the faith of all the baptized in the evangelising action". This is why, stressed Cardinal Filoni, "the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the Pontifical Mission Societies consider her, along with St. Francis Xavier and St. Therese of Jesus, the third element of the tripod on which the missionary work stands: at the same time the transformation of the Church, just as it was intended by Venerable Pauline-Marie Jaricot with the creation of her six 'Societies' are so similar to the 'dream' or to the hoped ecclesial 'conversion' of Pope Francis". Cardinal Filoni expressed the hope that "in the near future, this daughter of Lyon, this daughter of the Church, is recognized the exemplarity of Christian witness that ranks among the Blessed and Saints of the Church itself".
On Sunday, April 26, Fourth Easter Sunday, Cardinal Filoni presided over the Eucharistic celebration in the Basilica of Notre Dame de Fourvière, where the Venerable Pauline-Marie Jaricot, "the woman of the Mission Societies, the tireless worker of prayer and the victim of workers' solidarity" he said in his homily, "often came to Mary to manifest her anxieties, desires and put under Her protection the projects that were born from her feminine genius", in fact "after the Eucharist and the Sacred Heart of Jesus, her greatest love was Mary".
Referring then to the Gospel of the day, in which Jesus presents himself as "the good shepherd", the Cardinal said that "in this image there is love, mercy, service, altruism. Jaweh was the owner of the flock, Jesus qualifies himself as a good shepherd who sacrifices his life for his sheep, entrusted to him by Jaweh; he is not the mercenary who flees". This mission has not come to an end over the centuries, as he himself said that "none of the sheep that the Father has entrusted to him, will be left out of the fold, out of the house". "With these expressions - said Cardinal Filoni - he inaugurated the missionary action, entrusting this commitment first to his disciples and then to the whole Church. The service rendered by Jesus to the Father stretches out to the whole world. Here is the root of the missionary nature of the Church, the root of Jaricot’s intuition who intended to engage the laity in the missionary action" (SL) (Agenzia Fides 27/04/2015)


Share: