We Would Love
to Keep in Touch!
Editor: In this third of three articles, Fr. Charles Novel, M.S. (1912-1980), a true man of letters, with a Doctorate in Theology and in Sacred Scripture, reflects on a total of six major characteristics of the La Salette spirituality.
A Queen and Mother and her child, stained glass gift to Pope Paul VI, Vatican MuseumsA La Salette missionary (and all those who have devotion to Our Lady of La Salette) must be imbued with the spirit and love of the Church. That is how Fr. Giraud saw it. The Virgin Reconciler of La Salette appears as prototype and figure of the Church, mandated to proclaim the message of peace to all people (2 Corinthians 5:17-21).
Through the grace of La Salette, we participate, so to speak, in the mission of the apostles who were sent by Christ as ambassadors of reconciliation. When the Church authorized our foundation and approved our Constitutions, she shared her mission with us. Our mission is ecclesial.
Christ constituted the Church in a manner suited to the fulfillment of her mission. Everything in the Church—the hierarchy, the ministry of the Word, the sacraments—is at the service of humanity's reconciliation with God...
Having ascended into heaven where he mediates without ceasing on our behalf, spiritualized and Spirit-giver, Christ continues to act and to live on earth—in the Church and through her. He is busy actualizing in us the grace of reconciliation conquered by him.
Hence our vast respect for the Church and our affectionate submission to her...
The communitarian aspect of Salvation constitutes still another facet of our ecclesial spirituality. The Church is the Chosen People that God has, heirs of several millennia of Bible tradition diametrically opposed to insubmission (or disobedience). We the People with whom God, through his Christ, has contracted to the pursuit of justice...
We, the People called into divine service, a People of adorers, are the heirs of several millennia of Bible tradition diametrically opposed to insubmission. We, the People with whom God, through his Christ, has contracted an alliance, must now abide by the terms of that covenant: remembering that it is an alliance marked by the forgiveness of sin... a covenant sealed in Love...
The spirit of the Church must permeate our community life as well as our personal life. If our acts of worship—prayers and exercises—are grafted on the Church's liturgical life, they can be but ennobled. Indeed, what is the Liturgy if not a school of spirituality and a source of grace?
The Church is perpetually in a state of mission; and we participate in that mission. It is unthinkable that our apostolate should be curtailed by individualism, strangled in deliberate isolationism; on the contrary, it must be carried out in fraternal collaboration, in unanimity of thought, unity of heart, harmony of action. It should be centered from every quarter on the pursuit of the ends of the Congregation, given that the La Salette Community is dedicated to assignments and projects entrusted to it by the Church.
It is above all by applied charity that our communities reflect the ecclesial community (Ephesian 4:2-6).
Our Lady of La Salette, Queen of the MissionsOur spirituality is necessarily stamped with the missionary spirit of Our Lady of La Salette. Either we are really missionaries or we are nothing.
Gripped by the urgent need of leading the secularized masses back to God, possessed by the yearning to evangelize the non-Christians, we are stirred by the selfsame mercy that brought Mary to La Salette: our foremost concern will be the divinization of humanity.
The first item on our Community agenda is to introduce our fellow humans into God's serenity. What is La Salette's beatitude? “Happy the people of peace, for they shall be called the children of God.”
We have to face up to the issue concerning the end of our apostolate and the pastoral formulas best suited to attain the Congregation's goals.
Most certainly, we preach the apparition. A secret strength, a certain grace seems to linger and to be at work in Our Lady's words. The apparition narrative has a value all its own. It is our duty to make known the miraculous intervention of Mary the Reconciler in the life of her people.
But the “great news”, the event of La Salette, leads us up to a vision of faith that broadens considerably the scope of our preaching. Not only do we speak with special fondness of Mary, Reconciler of sinners—of her tenderness, of her great power—we must also preach the Christian Mystery of Reconciliation and its actualization in the Church.
There is no denying that new necessities crop up in various times and climes. It goes without saying that one of the most pressing needs in our day is “to restore the spirit of religion to humanity, especially to the Christian people.” It is no less urgent on our part to revive a sense of allegiance to the Church and a passion for her mission in the World...
As to the methods of our apostolate, we have our traditions, some of them are most worthy of veneration; but none of these excludes the possibility of turning to newer approaches, more appropriate to (our present day). Apostolic methods necessarily vary, and our willingness to adapt has always been a component of our spirit.
In a word, all means are valid if they lead our fellow human beings to a reconciliation with God.
Our spirituality must be ecclesial
A Queen and Mother and her child, stained glass gift to Pope Paul VI, Vatican MuseumsA La Salette missionary (and all those who have devotion to Our Lady of La Salette) must be imbued with the spirit and love of the Church. That is how Fr. Giraud saw it. The Virgin Reconciler of La Salette appears as prototype and figure of the Church, mandated to proclaim the message of peace to all people (2 Corinthians 5:17-21).Through the grace of La Salette, we participate, so to speak, in the mission of the apostles who were sent by Christ as ambassadors of reconciliation. When the Church authorized our foundation and approved our Constitutions, she shared her mission with us. Our mission is ecclesial.
Christ constituted the Church in a manner suited to the fulfillment of her mission. Everything in the Church—the hierarchy, the ministry of the Word, the sacraments—is at the service of humanity's reconciliation with God...
Having ascended into heaven where he mediates without ceasing on our behalf, spiritualized and Spirit-giver, Christ continues to act and to live on earth—in the Church and through her. He is busy actualizing in us the grace of reconciliation conquered by him.
Hence our vast respect for the Church and our affectionate submission to her...
The communitarian aspect of Salvation constitutes still another facet of our ecclesial spirituality. The Church is the Chosen People that God has, heirs of several millennia of Bible tradition diametrically opposed to insubmission (or disobedience). We the People with whom God, through his Christ, has contracted to the pursuit of justice...
We, the People called into divine service, a People of adorers, are the heirs of several millennia of Bible tradition diametrically opposed to insubmission. We, the People with whom God, through his Christ, has contracted an alliance, must now abide by the terms of that covenant: remembering that it is an alliance marked by the forgiveness of sin... a covenant sealed in Love...
The spirit of the Church must permeate our community life as well as our personal life. If our acts of worship—prayers and exercises—are grafted on the Church's liturgical life, they can be but ennobled. Indeed, what is the Liturgy if not a school of spirituality and a source of grace?
The Church is perpetually in a state of mission; and we participate in that mission. It is unthinkable that our apostolate should be curtailed by individualism, strangled in deliberate isolationism; on the contrary, it must be carried out in fraternal collaboration, in unanimity of thought, unity of heart, harmony of action. It should be centered from every quarter on the pursuit of the ends of the Congregation, given that the La Salette Community is dedicated to assignments and projects entrusted to it by the Church.
It is above all by applied charity that our communities reflect the ecclesial community (Ephesian 4:2-6).
Ours must be a missionary spirituality
Our Lady of La Salette, Queen of the MissionsOur spirituality is necessarily stamped with the missionary spirit of Our Lady of La Salette. Either we are really missionaries or we are nothing.Gripped by the urgent need of leading the secularized masses back to God, possessed by the yearning to evangelize the non-Christians, we are stirred by the selfsame mercy that brought Mary to La Salette: our foremost concern will be the divinization of humanity.
The first item on our Community agenda is to introduce our fellow humans into God's serenity. What is La Salette's beatitude? “Happy the people of peace, for they shall be called the children of God.”
We have to face up to the issue concerning the end of our apostolate and the pastoral formulas best suited to attain the Congregation's goals.
Most certainly, we preach the apparition. A secret strength, a certain grace seems to linger and to be at work in Our Lady's words. The apparition narrative has a value all its own. It is our duty to make known the miraculous intervention of Mary the Reconciler in the life of her people.
But the “great news”, the event of La Salette, leads us up to a vision of faith that broadens considerably the scope of our preaching. Not only do we speak with special fondness of Mary, Reconciler of sinners—of her tenderness, of her great power—we must also preach the Christian Mystery of Reconciliation and its actualization in the Church.
There is no denying that new necessities crop up in various times and climes. It goes without saying that one of the most pressing needs in our day is “to restore the spirit of religion to humanity, especially to the Christian people.” It is no less urgent on our part to revive a sense of allegiance to the Church and a passion for her mission in the World...
As to the methods of our apostolate, we have our traditions, some of them are most worthy of veneration; but none of these excludes the possibility of turning to newer approaches, more appropriate to (our present day). Apostolic methods necessarily vary, and our willingness to adapt has always been a component of our spirit.
In a word, all means are valid if they lead our fellow human beings to a reconciliation with God.
(Translated by then-Bro. Normand Theroux, M.S.)
(Reprinted from the La Salette publication, Reconcilare, Volume II, no. 2, December 1966, pgs. 10-14)