Society of St. Vincent de Paul

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SVdP News Roundup October 8 – October 14
SVdP News Roundup October 8 – October 14 1200 1200 SVDP USA

With 100,000 Vincentians across the United States and nearly 800,000 around the world, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul provides person-to-person service to those who are needy and suffering. Read some of their stories here:

INTERNATIONAL

NATIONAL

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A Week in Prayers October 10 – October 14
A Week in Prayers October 10 – October 14 940 788 SVDP USA

Monday, October 10

Lord, in Your glory,
Lord, in Your power,
You rule both heaven and earth.
Lord in Your mercy,
Lord, in Your love,
You heal my heart and soul.
Amen

Tuesday, October 11

God of mercy,
Grant Your mercy to me.
God of hope,
Grant Your hope to me.
God of love,
Grant Your love to me.
Fill my heart, O Lord,
Fill my soul to overflowing.
Amen

Wednesday, October 12

Holy Spirit, live within me!
Fill my heart with love, joy, and peace.
Join my heart to those in need
With patience, kindness, and generosity.
Soften my heart to serve
With faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Amen

Thursday, October 13

Lord Jesus, with every step I take,
I seek to follow Your way.
With every prayer and action
I seek to know the truth.
Through Your great love and mercy,
I seek eternal life.
Amen

Friday, October 14

I praise Your name, O Lord,
I seek to do Your will
At all times,
Even, and especially,
When it is difficult.
And with You at my side
I will not be afraid.
Amen

Daily Prayers are written by Tim Williams, National Vincentian Formation Director.
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10-13-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
10-13-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 1367 1520 SVDP USA

Dear Vincentian Friends,

Looking at the history of our Society, it is clear that the providence of God has given us the leadership we have needed at every point along our path so far. This month President Renato Lima de Oliveira declared the International Year of Jules Gossin, to honor the second President General of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. Gossin succeeded Emanuel Bailly and served as president from 1844 to 1847. Except for Bailly, our founders were young college students. Yet, when they selected his replacement, they looked to a man who was actually five years older than Bailly. The Society needed Gossin’s stable guidance for a few more years before it turned leadership over to a 28-year-old Adolphe Baudon, who would become our third and longest-serving President General.

We are in the process of electing our next national President. What is the leadership that we need next? You are each invited to participate in that discernment process through prayer and review of the material available on each of our two final candidates. Before you vote in your Conference meetings, I urge you to view the videos of the speeches John Berry and Brian Burgess gave at our recent National Assembly. You may even want to watch their speeches as part of a Conference meeting, and you should read their written platforms. We have two very qualified candidates; so please take the time to make an informed choice. We trust that in God’s providence we will be blessed with the leadership we need for the future.

Let me return to Jules Gossin and share a little about his contributions to our Society that are still relevant today. His presidency was a key bridge between our Society’s founding and its becoming a stable worldwide institution. Several years earlier, Gossin had founded another organization of Catholic lay people, the St. Regis Society, which was dedicated to regularizing the marriages of the poor. From the development of that group, he undoubtedly learned many lessons that were applicable to the challenges our Society faced as it grew.

Gossin’s most important contribution was the maintenance of a central governing structure that aggregated new conferences and required adherence to the Rule. Our first United States Conference in St. Louis was welcomed by Gossin with a letter dated May 25, 1845. The letter informed the Conference that its application for aggregation had been enthusiastically approved at the February 2 meeting of the General Council. The letter encouraged the Conference members in their work and their hopes for continued expansion in the United States. Today, some Conferences would prefer to act independently from the structures provided, but that would not be in keeping with the model passed on to us.

Even more interesting to me is that in the next letter from Gossin to the U.S. Conference members, he insists that they submit an annual report. At this time of the year, I hear complaints about having to file our annual reports. Some say that this is onerous and should not be required in our organization. Don’t look to history to validate your opinion. Gossin wrote to the new Conference in St. Louis on Nov. 16, 1846, “Dear Sir and Brothers, We have the pleasure of sending you herewith a report form for the use of your Conference and we beg you to answer it. We are asking this to enable us in the General Report for 1846, which shall soon occupy our attention, to give all information concerning your Conference. We hope that you will comply with our wish and that you will not only answer with the statistical sections but especially that you will give us details concerning the works which you are performing, their moral results and the good which you expect to accomplish. … Before leaving this consideration, may we add a few technical details. It is hoped that in totaling the amount of your income and disbursements you will terminate as of October 31st. Thus we will be enabled to give to the Conferences the exact amount of revenues for the year.”

Gossin continued, “We also pray you to send us the report by mail as soon as it is compiled. Each year we make greater and greater efforts to hasten the publication of the Report, and we hope this year to achieve our ambition.”

Our annual reporting requirements are important and have always been part of our tradition. I echo our second President General’s request: Please get your reports in by the deadline so that we can publish our National Council Annual Report in a timely manner. It is by this means of accountability that we can give testimony to the good we accomplish together for so many.

Serviens in spe,

Ralph Middlecamp
National Council President

P.S. I really enjoy history and will share a few more of Gossin’s insights during this year dedicated to his memory.

 

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Contemplation — Breathe Deeply
Contemplation — Breathe Deeply 940 788 SVDP USA

The word “spirit” has its roots in the Latin verb spīrāre, meaning “to breathe.” If we think, then, of the Holy Spirit as the breath of God, it seems easier to open ourselves to that spirit, to the wind upon the waters, and the breath of life. When we feel ourselves filled and moved by the Holy Spirit, we are literally inspired.

The founders of the Vincentian Family received a special grace from God, a charism. For St. Louise, her inspiration began following a period of great doubts, a dark night of the soul in which she began to doubt even the immortality of her soul. On the Feast of Pentecost, 1623, which commemorates the descent of the Spirit on the apostles, Louise prayed and felt herself suddenly relieved of all her doubts. [SWLM A.2]

This experience was so powerful that she wrote down all that she believed the Holy Spirit had spoken to her and carried that piece of paper, the account of her lumière (“light”) folded in her pocket for the rest of her life. It remains in the Motherhouse of the Daughters of Charity to this day.

The great peace that she instantly felt was threefold: first, that she would receive a new Spiritual Director (which would turn out to be St. Vincent); second, that she would one day fulfill her “first vow” to live a consecrated life in service of the poor; and third, that as long as she had her belief in God, the rest would be assured.

Importantly, nothing really changed in her daily life. She wouldn’t meet Vincent for another two years, the founding of the Daughters of Charity, in which she would live her religious vocation, was eight years away. In other words, she received a great interior peace solely through the movement of the spirit; not through an external event or change in her circumstances. Nothing that had been troubling her was resolved, but her heart had been changed.

The light she carried with her from that day forward helped her to see in the people and events of her life the Providence and Will of God; to further discern her charism – our charism – to serve Jesus in the poor and in each other.

Louise, “aware of [her] own brokenness and need for God’s grace” [Rule, Pt. I, 2.2] opened herself to the working of the Holy Spirit, exactly as we are called to do. Just as we breathe out only in order to breathe in again, we empty ourselves of self not to remain empty, but in order to be filled by God. And to be inspired, we breathe deeply.

Contemplate

How can I be more open to be moved by the Holy Spirit?

Recommended Reading

Mystic of Charity

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SVdP News Roundup October 1 – October 7
SVdP News Roundup October 1 – October 7 1200 1200 SVDP USA
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The Week in Prayers: October 3 – October 7
The Week in Prayers: October 3 – October 7 940 788 SVDP USA

Monday, October 3

Lord, I have seen You
In the ones who stop,
The ones who serve,
The ones who show mercy.
With Your help
I will go and do likewise.
Amen

Tuesday, October 4

Lord, strengthen me in conviction.
Grant me the vision to see You
In the poor, the suffering, and the deprived.
Help me to nurture the seed of sanctity
That You planted in my heart
I seek only to do Your will.
Amen

Wednesday, October 5

Father in heaven,
Fill me with the joy
Of making Your will my own
I give myself to You fully
As You gave Your Son to me
Amen

Thursday, October 6

Lord Jesus, I stand before the door.
I pray that You hear me knocking,
For You have invited me here.
Like the neighbor who invites me,
To give and receive,
In the great hope
That cannot be destroyed.
Lord Jesus, I stand before the door.
Amen

Friday, October 7

Lord, in Your name
Help me to cast out poverty
To cast out hunger
To cast out suffering
To cast out doubt and fear
To cast out all that separates
Your people from You
Replacing it with hope
And with the love of God
Amen
Daily Prayers are written by Tim Williams, National Vincentian Formation Director.
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10-06-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leader
10-06-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leader 1363 1363 SVDP USA

It is often said that history is written by the winners. For example, if our country’s Revolutionary War had been won by the British, our Founding Fathers would have been largely forgotten traitors and Benedict Arnold might be remembered today as a protector of the Empire. Perspectives are largely formed through the prisms of those who have benefitted from the experiences.

Let’s consider this, then, from a Catholic perspective. Who decides when something is the work of the Holy Spirit?

We hear this all the time when something good happens, right? When our position wins in a courtroom battle, when a storm misses our home, and when just the right leader has taken our parish or our Society’s Council to greater heights, we thank the Holy Spirit for being present and gracious in our lives. But hold on a minute. Does this mean that the Holy Spirit was actively working against that other position, those other homes that were damaged by the storm, and those other candidates who offered to help but who weren’t selected to lead?

Is the Holy Spirit really that personally involved, and indeed even that capricious? That doesn’t sound like part of the Holy Trinity to me.

We know from the Book of Isaiah that God’s thoughts are not our thoughts, and neither are our ways the Lord’s ways. Thus, we can’t begin to understand the presence and plans of the Holy Spirit, except perhaps to believe that the Holy Spirit is always with us, from our worst days and most unspeakable tragedies and pain to our most joyous days and celebrations. It’s all part of God’s plans for us that we don’t, and may never, understand.

We can be defeatist about all this and assume that because it won’t matter anyway, let’s just sit and be God’s lump of clay, simply exist with as little effort as possible, and wait until He calls us home. Or, since you are probably a Vincentian reading this column, you have instead assumed that God put you here for a purpose. You may not fully understand that purpose, but you assume it is for good! You further understand that the Holy Spirit helps you develop your potential for that good.  The Society of St. Vincent de Paul is just one of the tools given to you to build your spiritual formation, to serve God’s chosen people the Poor, and to help develop the good in others, too. Indeed, how could the Society have blossomed around the world to more than 150 countries and 800,000 members without the Holy Spirit’s guidance?

Who decides when the Holy Spirit is at work? At times, at least, we do. Not only when, but where- in the streets, in homes, in prisons, in nursing homes, in hospitals and shelters, wherever we do our works of mercy and hope. It is there extensively, and consistently – every day around the country and around the world. We are the chroniclers of today’s presence of the Holy Spirit through our lives and service.

Yours in Christ,
Dave Barringer
CEO

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A Week in Prayers September 19 – September 23
A Week in Prayers September 19 – September 23 940 788 SVDP USA

Monday, September 19

Who do You say that I am, Lord?
A servant, a neighbor, a friend?
Have I stopped for the victims
At the side of the road?
Have I offered food to the hungry?
Have I offered Your love
With the works of my hands?
Have I comforted all those in sorrow?
Have I done as You asked me,
In spite of myself?
Who do You say that I am?
Amen

Tuesday, September 20

How can I better know You, Lord?
Where can I see Your face?

In the lines of an old man’s face,
That mark his labor on this earth
In the laughter of a young girl’s eyes
Sparkling with mirth

In the sweat that earns
The family’s food
In the last breath drawn
In a hospital room

In these and more, I love you, Lord
Through these I serve You in hope.
Amen

Wednesday, September 21

Lord of mercy, lift me up
Fill me with Your grace
Grant me the mercy
To serve and to love
As You have loved
And served me.
Amen

Thursday, September 22

O my Jesus,
For Your kingdom
I will labor.
In Your name
And by Your grace,
I will not waver.
From dawn to setting sun
The work of love is never done
For Your sake,
And for Your love,
And for my neighbor
Amen

Friday, September 23

Daily Prayers are written by Tim Williams, National Vincentian Formation Director.

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SVdP News Roundup September 17 – September 23
SVdP News Roundup September 17 – September 23 1200 1200 SVDP USA
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09-22-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
09-22-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 400 400 SVDP USA

Editor’s note:

The following is a shortened version of the letter from Rev. Tomaž Mavrič, CM, Superior General of the Congregation of the Mission and leader of our Vincentian Family. Links to the compete letter in multiple languages are found later in this edition of the E-Gazette.

To the members of the Vincentian Family throughout the world:

Dear sisters and brothers,

May the grace and peace of Jesus be always with us!

We are fast-approaching the Feast of Saint Vincent that officially falls on 27 September, but, given the reality of a country, the celebration may be held on some other day to allow the greatest number of persons to attend.

We are seeing the return to in-person gatherings, which bring us joy and encouragement, since we are able again to witness as family, as persons of faith, participating in the Eucharist and other celebrations that a year ago were still hampered by the pandemic. This is an additional reason for us to put all our efforts and talents into making this observance of the feast of Saint Vincent de Paul a memorable one after these past few years of very limited gatherings or their prohibition.

In fact, the whole month of September is called a Vincentian month. Depending on the structure and program of the Vincentian Family in a given country, different events, gatherings, and initiatives may be offered throughout the month. These might include days of recollection for youth who are discerning a vocation to the consecrated life, as well as formation and charity initiatives to deepen our Vincentian spirituality and charism. We also invite others, who may not know Saint Vincent de Paul and the other Saints, Blessed, and Servants of God of the Vincentian Family, to get to know our Vincentian spirituality and charism through our words and deeds.

The title of this year’s letter for the Feast of Saint Vincent de Paul is, “From a Vincentian Family Structure toward a Vincentian Family Movement” and “Vincentian Centers of Spirituality and Formation around the world.”

Not so long ago, the international leaders of the different Vincentian Congregations of Consecrated Life and Lay Associations began to gather every year to build closer relationships and collaboration, as belonging to the same spiritual and charismatic group, even though each one retained its own specificity and uniqueness. This group began to be called “the Vincentian Family” and was symbolized by a tree with many branches. The central part of the tree with is roots is our common Vincentian spirituality and charism, and each branch represents an individual Congregation or Association. That is why we often use the word branches, having in mind the beautiful symbol of a tree.

The structured groups of Women’s and Men’s Congregations, and Lay Associations presently number 165. In addition, many other people, attracted and inspired by the person of Saint Vincent de Paul and the other Saints, Blesseds, and Servants of God of the Vincentian Family, do not belong officially to any of its branches. They are drawn to the Vincentian spirituality and charism through books, articles, the internet, radio, television, and social media. They would like to further their knowledge of the Vincentian way of thinking, speaking, and living, thus becoming active participants in the spirit of Saint Vincent de Paul, having the right to be called “Vincentians.” Already, a large number of persons who do not belong specifically to any group, because of their way of living out their lives, serving, thinking, speaking, and acting, embody the Vincentian spirit and charism. Here I see the further development of the Vincentian Family and this wonderful Vincentian Tree into what is becoming a so-called “Vincentian Family Movement.”

I would like to encourage all the international, national, and regional leaders of the structured branches of this beautiful tree called the Vincentian Family to invite as many members as possible of the Confraternities and the collaborators who do not belong to any specific group to participate in the different events that will be organized in the various countries throughout the month of September.

May Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, Saint Vincent de Paul and all the Saints, Blesseds, and Servants of God of the Vincentian Family, intercede before Jesus for us all!

Your brother in Saint Vincent,
Tomaž Mavrič, CM

Please send us pictures and videos of the various celebrations you organized throughout the Vincentian month of September, or short articles about them, to these two email addresses, and we will try to share the information through different means of communication.

Javier Fernández Chento: chento@famvin.org

Hugo Marcelo Vera, CM: nuntia@cmglobal.org

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