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| The Autobiography of Mgr. Ngô-dinh-Thuc - Part 4 |
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***
The building that served the Hué mission as
commissary was modernized by installing showers and toilets in each
room. Rooms were constructed to take on ill or retired ones so
that they could take pleasure in a visit from their brothers who went
to the Procurator or to the Bishop. An office building for Action
Catholique was built, with a room for the priest entrusted with this
action.
After all the events at that time I considered
building a new cathedral, because the old one, which had been built
more than 25 years earlier by a former priest, was decrepit. After its
construction the former priest became apostolic vicar of Hué. The roof
and the frame had been damaged by white mice (termites) and were in
danger of collapsing during the next typhoon.
The construction plan, mild modernistic, for the new
cathedral, was made by a non-Catholic Vietnamese, a laureate of the
French school of Rome. Made out of steel concrete and therefore
resistant to typhoons and termites, it would offer a becoming place for
religious ceremonies and would be large enough for more than 5.000
people. I had a sum to purchase the materials and the manpower would be
provided by the parish children of Phû-cam, (the parish of the
cathedral and my birth parish). Free labour was managed by paid
experts. I could not pursue this construction to completion and my
successor Mgr. Diên had the honour of initiating the new cathedral in a
concelebration with the majority of the priests from the
archdiocese. At my departure, the interior of the cathedral was
finished; only the construction of the facade remained. As I said
earlier, I had to expand Hue's major seminary, which turned into the
regional seminary for Hué and the suffragan dioceses of this
capital. The chapel was enlarged so that it seat more than 100
major seminarians - the old one had only approximately 30 seats. The
refectory, the classrooms, the professors' housing had to be furnished
for their new use. God wanted that I be present at the completion of
this regional seminary.
Since the minor seminary was in territory occupied
by the Communists from the north, I found a place in the middle of the
city of Hué. I could build a minor seminary for 300 students out
of steel concrete, with a beautiful chapel, a kitchen and apartments
for the kitchen sisters, and add a soccer field. All of this occurred,
the major and minor seminary, with my brother's money, the president.
***
I describe everything in fine detail so that the
ones who will come after me remember the great benefactor of the
archdiocese of Hué. It is due to his generosity that I could accomplish
this whole modernization program during my brief stay in Hué. My
brother never has mentioned a single word to anyone of his unselfish
help, just as during the construction of the Vietnamese parish of
Paris. Unfortunately his discretion was misused by Father Gríân,
who announced, urbi et orbi, which he had paid for his parish buildings
with his own money. Where should he have gotten it, he, who out of
fear, had fled from the Communists to Paris penniless? My brother did
not tell me one single word about this help. I only found out about it
thanks to a woman, Nhu, the witness of the conversation between the
President and Father Gríân.
Father Gríân's claims regarding ownership of the
chapel and the ministration in this Vietnamese parish in Paris is
therefore essentially a theft, exactly like all the advantages he got
that resulted from it, for example the use of the restaurant that
is situated beneath the chapel and is visited by many Vietnamese and
foreign customers. That is the source of this priest's wealth, who has
become a multimillionaire and owns villas and other restaurants.
Unfortunately, this priest, who converted to the Catholic faith and was
once so devout, could not resist the enticements of gold. He turned
into a racketeer, succeeded in getting all of his siblings from Vietnam
to Paris and at present the entire family rides around in luxury cars!
Let the dear Lord grant him remorse and the return to the piety of his
youth.
During the few years as the archbishop of Hué my
life was full. I went to bed in the evening about 9 o'clock and got up
early for meditation and Mass; afterwards, correspondence. Everything
was finished by 7 o'clock. I then went to Phû-cam to take communion to
my mother, who lay in bed paralyzed by arthritis. After that I
went to the building sites to supervise the construction work.
At about 9 o'clock I was in the Bishop’s palace to
receive priests and people from the diocese, who wished to see
me. Regarding the priests: They introduced themselves with
a document on which their requests or questions were written.
Then I could answer them with a few words and would write them if the
questions required extended consideration. Therefore the brothers
did not need to eternally stay in Hué but could go back to their
parishes, one day at the latest after their arrival in the Bishop's
palace.
Every month I summoned the Bishop's council, which
consisted of Pro-vicars and District officials, so that they completely
informed me about their districts.
One matter was very important to me: My archdiocese
should be self sufficient—therefore economically independently. The
same problem and the same worry as in Vinhlong. Rome, i.e. the Holy
Congregation for spreading the faith must pay for the needs of the
missions. The money comes from the faithful: Members from the effort
for spreading the faith, the works of the Holy Childhood, and the works
of the Holy Apostle Peter. The first two charities were donated
by a French Christian woman. Vietnam had therefore an hierarchy
that no longer consists of Apostolic Vicars but of Archbishops and
Bishops although it was still dependent upon the Holy Congregation for
the Propagation of the Faith. Therefore, in principle, Catholic Vietnam
had to stand on its own feet and had to leave the papal mission works
alms to the actual missions. But how should one make this concept
comprehensible to our Christians? How should one teach them this?
At first the offerings made our parishes autonomous.
And one had to involve our faithful in the planning of our parish
budget. The priest might gather his parish children and tell them how
much money the parish needs: School, school sisters, church service
etc.... and each adult person's participation in it, everyone according
to his abilities. The budget submitted by the priest must be
approved by parish members. The collected amount would be publicly
announced. Therefore, even the smallest donation is known to all and
the entire parish is aware of the expenses as well. Normally, it should
suffice if our parish members abstain from one pack of cigarettes every
week to get their parish back on its feet!
Usually the priests do not like this course of the
action; they rather would get the money without having to extensively
publicize their expenses, while the Christians want to know what was
done with their contributions. The parish must have one single soul.
Little by little, one gets used to it and everyone is proud to be able
to stand on their own feet. I do not know, whether my successor
still encourages our believers and our priests to do their duty and to
share their worries with their sheep. It is more comfortable not
to give any accounting about the administration, not to discuss, and to
get parish members to consent to this, but rather use the contributions
according to their own their discretion,.... a dialogue is more
arduous than to decide everything per ukas (commanding representatives).
In Vinhlong I always had to urge my priest on to
have a dialogue with the believers. This however, is not submissiveness
but plain and simple justice when using other people's money only with
their approval. One also gets quickly used to it because the
human being is - of course a very pale - nevertheless a reflection of
God! God, his creator, who is the perfect justice.
***
My priests from Hué (my dear home) are either older
than I and knew me as their student in seminary, were fellow students
or were my students in the major seminary or - finally - were my
younger brothers in the priesthood. They know my weaknesses, but
however, are also grateful for my respect and affection toward
them. They know, that I, as each human being, can err, but
they are also confident that I have tried have to make the
archdiocese of Hué at least equal to the two other archdioceses (Saigon
and Hanoi).
Spiritually and with regard to apostolic eagerness, Hué is equivalent
to the other dioceses or better. The clergy may be economically poor
and may have only the Mass offerings to live from but the clergy do
very well in converting the heathens.
They know that the burden I impose on them is
absolutely necessary for their welfare and that of their diocese.
Therefore, despite my ouster from my archdiocese without a convincing
reason, Hué has never previously experienced such a blossoming as
during the few short years of my administration. My priests remained
loyal to me, except a few who comprised the circle around my successor
Mgr. Diên. He noticed this situation quickly and complained to
the Holy See about this lack of affection and he believed that I
stirred up a latent opposition. I had to defend myself and
requested evidence of my secret activities from the Holy Congregation
for the Propagation of the faith. I have never written anything
else to my former diocesan seat, and that only to my few correspondence
partners, other than: You should obey your Bishop, and the obedience is
more valuable than all sacrifices. That was the size if it. I do not
need to regret my behaviour toward Mgr. Diên, because the members of my
clergy, who fled to America or to Europe, still demonstrate their
affection for me despite my long absence from Vietnam.
***
Perhaps one might ask why I placed such a value on
having a primary seminary in Hué that was capable of serving 300
students. It was because our Christians in Hué are poor and there is
only a course of lectures at secondary level. I was the director
of this school where tuition had to be paid and was therefore
inaccessible for the vast majority of Catholics. The seminarians,
who continue up to the priesthood, are not very numerous but those who
leave the seminary earn a good living as a civil servant. They provide
many services for us there; they also act as leaders of Action
Catholique, which is even better.
But I have not forgotten the question of the late
callings: I gave the following instructions to our priests in the
seminary: Accept these young people lovingly and advise them that
they should conclude their studies where they had begun them after the
acquisition of the high school diploma maturity examination. According
to these continuing studies they were accepted into the seminary to
allow them to learn Latin for two years. Afterwards they entered
the major seminary. In the meantime however, measures were taken so
that they maintained their decision for priesthood: To gather
them on the off days in the minor seminary and let them take part in
the lives of the seminarians and to talk to them about their calling.
This regular and frequent contact is imperative,
because the world lures them and the spiritual position in Hué is not
particularly brilliant from an economic point of view. Can one
say that the late callings are more resistant and produce better
priests than the ones that come to the priesthood in the normal way
through the seminaries? Nothing proves that. I have seen
late callings that failed and others that persevered, as is also the
case with the ones educated in our seminaries.
One of my administration's goals in Hué was to make
real nuns out of our Sisters of the Cross with the three Religious
vows. Hué had 5 cloisters (monasteries): in Dilsan, a large
Christian community in the Quâng-tri province; in Cov ˙n, the capital
of Quâng-tri: in D ˙oDg-Son, in the Hué province: Phû-cam, also in Hué;
and Kebang in the Quâng-Binh province. Every monastery has its
assets, its noviciate, its area of apostolic work and his school.
Common to all of them was the absence of the Religious vows, and that
since their foundation at the beginning of the Vietnam's
evangelization. Vietnam's first Apostolic Vicar found that some
communal female organizations existed, but without any spiritual bond.
He gave them a guide for the communal life without Religious
vows. That was certainly comfortable for their employers, i.e.
the Bishop and the priests: One could use them for
everything: to teach the Catechumens, to cook for the seminaries
and the hospitals, to harvest the mission's rice paddies, etc.!
They are at the priests' disposal, workers with a very low wage, who
work day and night if they are needed. A minimum of piety
exercises, one month of vacation per year and until they can no longer
work; the mother house then takes them in again and buries them. No
rights, no defence, and a minimum of religious training.
The devotion, skilfulness and bravery of the
Vietnamese woman are admirable. Perhaps she is superior to the
Vietnamese man. The first rioters against Vietnam's invaders—the
Chinese—were the two sisters Trung-trûc and Trung-Nhi. They raised the
revolt's flag, and beat the Chinese in several battles; and then, as
they were surrounded by the superior forces, they committed suicide by
drowning themselves in a river. But our compatriots followed
their example and succeeded in expelling the Chinese from Vietnam after
a thousand years of occupation.
When I was a Bishop in Vinhlong, our two orders of
the Sisters of the Cross in Caimon and Cáínhum had recently sworn their
vows, but their use by the parish clergy was improper. The nuns were
always in pairs, an old one and a young one, therefore a difficult
companionship. Theoretically, they always had to be to in pairs.
Practically, they were often alone: for example if the priest sent one
into the parsonage to get something or to church to bring him
something. A sly priest could be "solus cum sola" with a
young woman of the order, court her or could abuse her. This
occurred, not often, but on some occasions. To whom should one
complain? The nun's program lasts 10 months and then she returns to the
order for only the two months of June and July to recover.
Make your own judgement about my dumbfoundedness
when the nun told me during confession that she seldom received mass
and communion each month because she had to stay with her Catechumens
in their small parish. The priest however, holds mass only once
on Sundays and holidays in the main parish, where his residence
is. A lot of work and not very much food, since it is quickly
prepared by the young nun and also quickly eaten. They visit the
catechumens, not only women and children, but adult and young strong
men, with very meagre spiritual food. If these nuns could resist
temptation, it was heroism. I therefore insisted that my priests
pay for the nuns' trips so that they could go to Mass, to confession
and to the communion at least once every week. Otherwise, I took
the nuns away from them. I sent them (the young ones) to school
in Saigon to the French Nuns of St. Paul of Chartres so that they
acquired the "diplôme élémentaire" and the more gifted ones obtained
the "brevet élémentaire" and became school nuns (teachers) during the
postulate and noviciate. With these paltry diplomas, they were like
academics to our priests, who did not have any state diplomas other
than Latin. Consequently, they were gradually respected. And as I
established the Catholic university in Dalat, some went there and could
acquire a licentiate, because the Vietnamese woman is very intelligent.
In Hué, I therefore selected two nuns from each
order and sent them to Dalat to the Canonesses of St. Augustine who
have a junior college there. These Sisters of the Cross completed a
noviciate like real nuns there and then they returned to Hué. And
since this time all sisters, old and young, had to complete their
noviciate and become real nuns. The noviciate and the secondary
school are both in the Apostolic Delegate's old palace in Hué.
This palace of the Apostolic delegate from Hué had
been made available to me because the Delegate acquired a seat in
Saigon in order to be near the civil government, since Saigon was the
political capital. There is a common Mother Superior for all
orders now. She resides in the house and has my family’s property,
where I was born, at her disposal and is advised by one of my own
nieces, who acquired a licentiate in Rome and also lives there.
The orders protect their possessions; yet they also pay for the
maintenance of the common noviciate and the secondary school. These
congregations, therefore, are a success and a true comfort for me.
A bitter wind of persecution blows in Vietnam, but
the Sisters are well prepared to hold up against it, as did their
predecessors during the 200 years of persecution. No Sister of the
Cross renounced Jesus by stepping on the cross with her feet, although
a priest and a seminarian did so. The latter, in contrast to the
priest, regretted his cowardice and was trampled by an elephant led by
the persecutors. The priest’s name was Duyêt. The seminarian’s name:
the blessed messenger. This justifies my opinion about the value of a
Vietnamese woman, unique in the world.
All of this was realized in a relatively short time
span, between 1960 and 1968. Eight years, half of which I spent
in Rome, The half was first to prepare for the council and then to
participate in the second Vatican council. That was the last high
point of my priestly and Episcopal activity. The rest of my life is a
series of failures, on whose course I will report, after I have
described my modest role at the pastoral council.
***
The second Vatican Council was due to John XXIII's
initiative. His epithet was "the good", but in my insignificant
opinion, this very devout, very saintly Pope was a weakling. He
admitted this fault. One could apply this saying to him: "Video
meliora, deteriora sequor." "I wanted the best but did the worse."
John XXIII wanted a renaissance of the church and
had a wonderful plan for it. But oh, he could not withstand the
pressure of the men of the Church. These men wanted to modernize
Christ's Church with the help of the modern world, "in malo positus",
which has turned evil. Because we are the generation at the "end of
time ", where Satan's last battle against God will occur: the decisive
battle, which after some turns of fate, ends with Lucifer's defeat and
Christ’s final triumph and the Final Judgement.
Satan had the atheistic communism as an army. On the
surface, the Jew Marx’s communism is tempting. He desires the welfare
of the people and wants a greater justice in distribution. He
wants to destroy capitalism without God. The single goal of
capitalism is the profit of the individual through the exploitation of
the worker. The goal of Marxism may be worthy of praise,
happiness and a paradise on earth, but his goal does not go further.
For him, religion is only opium for the people to become numb.
The people that the capitalists let work to fill their vaults are like
hunting dogs that are kept in order to obtain game. Marx, therefore, is
the direct descendant of the philosophers of the enlightenment with
Voltaire at the forefront….
The Church of Christ certainly, as personified in
some of its leaders, in some Popes, depended on the mighty and rich in
faith to find help for the triumph of the Church. Vatican II
should have begun by remembering this principle: To triumph through the
cross is to triumph through martyrdom.
The consequence is that Communism rises up without
God or rather, against God! The paradise of Communism is the same as
that of Capitalism: an earthly paradise. The effort that God the
Creator imposed on man is to develop, to perfect his intellectual,
supernatural and physical abilities and not the single goal of filling
his belly. Vatican II seems to have the same goal as Communism:
temporal human bliss. The following scandal therefore occurred:
Prohibition of the least attack against Communism. Therefore the
dogma: "the natural goodness of all types of beliefs". Therefore
the triumph of the Protestant axiom: Freedom of thought and the
equality of all religious opinions. Therefore the effort to make
the Catholic religion easier, in that "not guilty" is issued for the
one who does not pray the Breviary or meditate any longer and the
writing of a patent Mass acceptable for Catholics and
Protestants. The first (Catholics) may be supporters of the
teachings of transubstantiation, but the second ones (Protestants) do
not believe it. They claim that Mass is only in memory of the Last
Supper and not a "Mysterium fidei".
Vatican II did not dare to forbid Mass in Latin,
Christianity's common language, particularly in the central part of
Mass, the canon, but allowed the use of vernacular for the other parts;
supposedly, so that the faithful could hear and understand Mass
better. On that occasion they forgot that the faithful could very
well follow Mass read by the ministrants in Latin with a bilingual
missal. In the "New Bugnini-Mass", in agreement with the
Protestants, especially the Protestant monks of Taize, the fathers of
the modern church, Latin has been abolished as the official language of
the Latin-Catholic Church, which is also the language of diplomacy in
Europe. (Translator’s comment: French was the language of Diplomacy
after the Westphalian Peace of 1648).
One believed that this approach of Vatican II toward
our separated brothers would lead the Protestants to us. Now, no return
to Catholicism takes place, but rather has resulted in the shortening
of the prayers and meditative spirit of the Mass. The preference of
this action has led to many priests resigning from the priesthood. How
many marriages of priests and people from the Religious Orders? How
many nuns leaving the convents! No more vocations! Neither for the
seminary nor for the Religious Orders. Only the strict Orders that have
remained loyal to their regimen have new entrants.
The churches are empty. The new Mass, where the
priest is only the chairperson of the meeting—and no longer the only
one who sacrifices, always has less and less visitors. Each country has
its own Mass which is suited to the mentality of its people: The
Japanese sit on their heels around a mat as altar. Instead of the
monumental crucifix that dominates our old churches, a little cross
lies on a small table that serves as an altar, - without altar stone.
The Mass is bungled through in twenty minutes. The rare communion
recipients communes standing and no longer kneels. They receive
the wafer in the hand and chew on it like candy instead of receiving it
on the tongue. The oral confession is no longer fashionable; one
is content with the Confiteor of Mass despite the reminder from the
Holy Congregation for the Defence of the Faith. The priest reads Mass
with his back to the tabernacle!
One now comprehends Mgr. Lefebvre’s rebellion, the
success of his Ecône seminaries and the increase of his priories in
France and elsewhere; and the uneasiness in all Christian countries of
Europe and America. The future of the church is threatened by the
lack of vocations. Marxism triumphs everywhere. Africa is attacked by
Castro’s Cubans. South America, where the Catholic religion
formerly prevailed without dispute, is divided by the struggle between
traditionalists and supporters of the Vatican II. Soviet Russia is
active everywhere, its fleet is the strongest in the world and its
military budget exceeds that of the United States. It interferes
in Africa, in South America, everywhere—even in the Vatican, where Paul
VI, despite so many disappointments with his politics, insists on
offering Communism a hand.
The former statements allow one to understand my
role on the council: My few interventions had the goal of defending
Christ’s church against the modernistic attacks, against the
disparagement of the church by a well organized modernistic party under
the leadership of Suenens and other prelates like Marty, the current
Cardinal Archbishop of Paris. I must also add that the majority
of the council fathers, particularly those from North America, did not
understand Latin well, the official and binding language of the
council. They spent the bulk of the council debates in both cafes set
up in St. Peter, where they drank coffee or Coca Cola. They only
returned at the time of the vote in the council auditorium without
properly knowing what they were voting about.
They voted randomly, once with YES, once with NO
(for a change they said), and these votes were officially "inspired by
the Holy Spirit" and were counted up to make up the "majority." I saw
other Fathers—very few—, that did the call on the Holy Spirit—not in
the cafes but rather prayed the rosary at their seats and asked their
neighbours for advice about the vote!
The innovation of simultaneous interpretations had
to be introduced at the Council, especially into English or
French. This was done so that everyone knew what was going on and
could vote according to his conscience and knowledgeably fulfil a
Council Father's role. Everyone saw how an American Cardinal left
the council after a few sessions and went back to America. He said that
his presence at the council is less useful for the Holy See’s Council
than his return to the home of the almighty Dollar to collect more
money. It was very expensive due to having to rent facilities
near St. Peter’s Basilica for the entire duration of the council and
eating at the well frequented taverns!
One saw many changes of opinion at the council;
Prelates, who were initially confirmed traditionalists, turned into
modernists after some sessions when they noticed that Paul VI was for
the modernists. (He was not present at the council, supposedly to
demonstrate that he did not want to influence the opinions of the
Fathers; but he followed the debates on a radio). Therefore they
changed their opinion as not to mess up receiving their high church
offices and above all the red hat of the Cardinal's dignity. This is
what the secretary of the Holy Congregation of the Index, the
Congregation for the Defence of the Faith today. He betrayed his
superior, the admired Cardinal Ottaviani, in order to follow Suenens.
An examination of the votes and interventions of the
Council Fathers that are stored in the archives of the Vatican, would
confirm my claims. We should be surprised about this situation. The
following Councils displayed the same phenomena. An Athanasius
fought almost alone for the righteous belief and he had to exert
immense energy and patience in order to get a majority. At his time
there were a few hundred council Fathers. Vatican II had more
than 2.000 participants. The Bishops are selected less because of
their theological knowledge but rather because of their skill and their
good relationships to the Nuncios and Apostolic Delegates, who suggest
the successors for vacant Bishoprics to the Roman die casters.
My presence at the council far away from Vietnam
saved my life. Otherwise, I would have been murdered like my three
brothers, the president Diêm, Nhu and Cân. While my colleagues
from South Vietnam returned to Vietnam after the council’s conclusion,
the Americans forced the South Vietnamese into refusing my return
visa. Frankly said, there was no reason to refuse this
return: The Vietnamese Embassy asked me to be patient while it
conferred with the government in Saigon. I waited some months and
turned to the Holy Father for help that permission would be granted so
that I could return.
I do not know what the Holy Father Paul VI did, but
he used the situation that I could not return to my diocese in Hué, to
force me into abdication and appoint his favourite, Mgr. Dién, in my
place.
In order not to wallow in the idleness, I asked to
do service in Italy as a vicar in a parish, which was not difficult for
me, because I spoke Italian fluently and love the Italians. At first, I
went into the Abbey Casamari. The Reverend Abbot met me and Mgr
I. Lê-hûû-Tu, who accompanied me there. He was a Cistercian and
belonged to the same order as Casamari. This is a very old Abbey
that had been established by St. Bernhard of Clairvaux. He
suggested that I take an apartment there. I spent months there
and was glad that I could be the monks` confessor in the monastery and
for the parish faithful who were dependent on the abbey. Due to no
fault of my own I had to leave them a little over a year later. That
was the beginning of the last portion of my life that would be marked
only by failures. Providential failures.
***
Since the nationalistic government in Saigon was
incited by the Americans to deny me the entry visa to Vietnam, I needed
to look for a not too expensive apartment in Rome. I made the rounds at
all the accommodations for clergy. I was definitely rejected
everywhere, although politely. I believe that the reason was my
bishop's title. One was certain that I would take liberties and provide
a bad example for the students. "Et sui eum non receperunt" which
means: "And his own received him not."
Fortunately, a former Apostolic Delegate in Vietnam
showed me some quarters. Mgr. Caprio was indebted to me and to
the government of Saigon that was previously under my brother Diêm's
leadership. Mgr. Caprio had been a guest of the Franciscan
Sisters during his stays in Rome and I immediately took advantage of
the opportunity. The Mother Superior, a Luxemburger, took me in
and even granted me a rent discount. For 50.000 Lire monthly, I had
rights to a small room and three meals per day. I also found apostolic
work with the priest of the adjoining parish: to read Holy Mass at
11:00 a.m., to hear the confessions of the faithful, and to visit about
100 ill people each month who could not attend church, since they were
unable to walk. Twice a month at about 3:00 p.m., I did my rounds
and brought them Holy Communion. I did this after I heard their
confessions, if they had asked me to do so.
The priest gave me the princely sum of 30.000 Liras
per month for this service. Therefore I still had to find the 20.000
Liras for the service in this rather rich parish. This was
necessary to fully pay for room and board with the Sisters. The priest
explained to me that he gave this salary to his former Vicar, who had
left him. I informed him that this Vicar lived in a room for free
and in addition to this salary, partook of the priest's brotherly
meals. He replied that he needed the Vicar's former room for his
guests and that it would be an honour for him to receive me for dinner
at the main holidays of the year.
I accepted these rather draconian conditions,
because I was happy to do this Apostolate, and I believe that the
parish children were content with my services. They told me this
several times, and I was confident that I had found no source of
wealth, but had found an opportunity to modestly practice my priestly
Apostolate.
After more than a year, a thunderstorm suddenly
broke out. We were in the middle of the “dog's days” (hot and muggy).
Rome was as hot as an oven. After visiting the ill, I was soaked with
perspiration and wished to take a shower. However, the Nuns did not
have a shower there, but used Sundays to take a hot bath with water
from their kitchen. Therefore I went into the parsonage where
there was always hot water for the bathtub that was reserved for the
Vicars. But the priest forbade me this and literally said, "Since you
live with the Nuns, you must bath with them and not in the parsonage."
However the Sisters only had a bath on Sundays. Angered by the priest's
refusal, "I threw the towel in". This was how my first Apostolate in
Italy ended, to the great sorrow of the parish faithful and especially
my ill (faithful). Because the priest's refusal was not the
consequence of his stinginess but a certain jealousy since he noticed
that my confessional was visited by his parish children and that a
number of his lambs had left him in order to make me their Father
Confessor.
How should one prove this? I had the habit of going
to the church to meditate and to pray my Breviary so I could perhaps be
available for my penitent. Otherwise, the people had to find the
Sexton, who was not always in the church in order to confess. And if he
was there, he had to get the priest, who was not always in the
parsonage. I, however, was constantly in the church and could
immediately hear the penitent's confession and they could return home
afterward.
During the summer the priest took one month of
vacation and allowed me to use his confessional. Outside of this month
I had to use my own confessional. It was located at the church
entrance and the priest's confessional was near the main altar.
The priest held Holy Mass one morning. He was praying the Lord's
Prayer. I listened to this Mass as a lady spoke to me and asked me to
hear her confession, since it was the first anniversary of a relative's
death. Since the time for communion was pressing, I believed it
was more practical to hear her confession in the priest's confessional.
The confession had hardly begun, and then I heard screams. I limited
myself to saying: "Whoever you are, be quiet, because I am listening to
a confession."
The confession hardly finished, I saw the priest
while exiting, red with fury. He told me: "you do not have the right to
use my confessional!" I answered: "Father, I will explain it to you
after Mass, in the Sacristy". In the sacristy, I told him the
story of this woman, who had to confess, in order to take communion at
Mass, but he had been busy with the Lord's Prayer. Therefore she would
not have received any communion if I had had to go to the rear of the
church. The priest replied: "Bad luck for her, she should have had to
come to church earlier. In any case, you do not have the right to
use my confessional."
I had never previously seen a priest with so little
charity. The Lord ran after the lost sheep, but for the shepherd of the
parish "The Heart of Jesus and Mary" it was rather insignificant. The
possession of his confessional was important to him, even if he was
absent from his church. However, the reason for this
intransigence was: His lambs informed him of the parish gossip before
the confession of their sins. A fact: As I was in this confessional
during the priest's vacation, his penitents very often began their
reports since they believed that the priest was in the
confessional. I reprimanded them immediately and told them that
the confessional is there for their sins to be confessed and not for
reporting his neighbour’s sins. I was then chased out of this parish
and consequently had to find other quarters, since the Nun’s paid
hospitality was only suitable for one with a job.
Where should I go now? After I had carefully
thought about it, I remembered an invitation extended to me by the
Reverend Father Cistercian Abbot of Casamari to come stay with him in
central Italy, where I could do a little good without spending any
money. The large abbey only had about 30 monks for the 100 cells
and the additional 30 cell for the novices. At that time there
was only one single novice.
I wrote, and Abbot Buttarazzi replied immediately;
he repeated his invitation. I got underway with a bus from Rome
to Casamari in the Frosinone province. This is how I became the guest
of the very old abbey that had been established in the Middle Ages by
the students of St. Bernard of Clairvaux. Almost all of the priories
scattered around Italy are dependent upon it.
Once, the Casamari Cistercian congregation consisted
of hundreds of monks, but the number of the monks from this
Congregation is rather reduced currently. The most fertile branch is in
Vietnam with an abbot who lives in Thíu-dûé near Saigon. His
jurisdiction includes two monasteries that had to retreat to
Cochin-china to flee the Communist advance in Central Vietnam.
The Vietnamese Cistercian congregation was founded
by a former missionary from the Foreign Missions of Paris, Father
Denis, who was once my professor in the minor seminary of Anninh.
He founded it because he could not convince the French Trappist Fathers
to emigrate to Vietnam. This is why the Cistercians in Vietnam
are usually inaccurately called Trappists, because they adopted the
penitent life of the Trappists which is connected with the Cistercians,
who allow great freedom in the organization of monastery discipline in
each monastery.
The Casamari monastery, lead by Reverend Dom Nivardo
Buttarazzi, owns much land: hundreds of hectares of fields and forests.
The monastic life is no longer as when founded by the great Bernard of
Clairvaux. That is the consequence of the material affluence that
undermines the orders. The meals in Casamari are simple, yet extensive
and well prepared. The days of fasting are very far apart.
Outside the main prayers such as Matins, followed by the convent Mass,
the monks only go into the abbey church in the evening to sing the
Compline before they go to bed and for a few minutes of collection
after lunch and dinner. As to the meals, I experienced better in
France
The Father Abbot had accommodations for me in the
guest house, in a rather spacious room. There were also two parlours in
this home, one for the Abbot's visitors and the other for those of the
monks. In addition to the toilets, there were bathrooms with warm
water and showers. The laundry is collected every Saturday by the Nuns
for cleaning. They also take care of the kitchen and live in an
apartment near the entrance of the abbey. The store where the
monks sell the famous liqueurs of the abbey is in this area, near the
main entrance. The distilled products from various plants are harvested
in several areas throughout Italy and are all deemed invigorating. The
abbey also owns a boarding school that is associated with a theological
college. The school is visited by the sons of families that pay
an appropriate upkeep, but is also open to the minor Cistercian
Postulants who have free room, board and instruction. A large number of
families around of Casamari profit from it, but the majority of their
children leave the postulate after secondary training. This is
why the noviciate had only one novice!
The Cistercian order, which includes more than 10
Congregation worldwide, is lead by Abbot Sighard Kleiner. He has
the title of General Abbot and is assisted by the Father Abbot
Gregorio, Procurator and General Postulator, a former Casamari monk
with Roman residence.
A rather moderate leadership, particularly after Vatican II reduced the
monastic obligations to a minimum. This is why vocations are so rare.
For vocations are directed at the orders that could remain loyal to
their old strictness.
The service in Casamari that I found myself, through
the silent consent of the Reverend Father Abbot, was the hearing of
confessions of the monks. They found it more pleasant to confess
to a stranger than to their confessor with whom they had lived together
since the postulate. Saturday and in the morning Mass my
confessional was open for the Casamari parish children, a parish of
almost 5000 souls. Therefore I had sufficient work. The time
outside of my cell I spent visiting the abandoned abbey church. I
prayed the way of the cross and to our Lord there, in his tabernacle,
most of the time solus cum solo. I spent more than 15 months in
Casamari as in paradise, but it was written that this wonderful time
would also darken and a sudden vehement storm awaited me.
After I had travelled to Rome due to personal
issues, upon my return I immediately noticed that something had
changed. The Reverend Father Abbot was absent. I was hardly in my
rooms when I saw the Prior coming with a very sad face—he was my
penitent. He told me that I must leave Casamari as soon as possible and
find another place to stay. Why did they throw me out? The Prior
told me: "The Father Abbot was informed that you reported to the
Vatican, that a nude exhibition was opened in the abbey's library. The
Abbot was censured by Reverend Abbot Sighard, the highest authority of
the Cistercian order." I remembered the letter that I sent, under
the seal of the reticence, to Abbot Sighard. In this
letter, I asked this Abbot to inform the Vatican that a Casamari monk,
accompanied by an Italian priest, a Postulant of this monastery had
taken offence to the opening of the nude exhibition and particularly to
the brochure that displayed these things. The brochure had been
printed in the monastery’s printing office and given free of charge to
the parish children and had been sent to visitors. The Abbot’s
name and then my name appeared on the cover page as if we were the
honorary chairpersons of this rather unique exhibit. The two
informed me of this unique exhibition that could cause displeasure at
the Vatican.
In my letter to Abbot Sighard, I wrote that I knew
nothing at all about this exhibition and that no one had asked me for
my consent to appear there as honorary co-chairperson. I
therefore asked the Abbot to put things straight in the Vatican again,
but not to let this correspondence become known in Casamari,
however. Abbot Sighard had possessed the thoughtlessness, to
reveal the content of my letter to Abbot Buttarazzi. Therefore
Buttarazzis's anger and his decision to throw me out of the abbey
immediately. There were no sanctions against the sponsors of the
scandalous exhibition but punishment for me, the alleged informer
against the monks. The Prior granted me a period of one day to
pack my things and to find refuge.
After long consideration, I remembered the sympathy
of this region's Bishop toward me. I went to the Bishop's palace and
asked him if there was any chapel with a sacristy where I could put a
desk, a bed to sleep on and could establish myself. The Bishop
responded that there was a beautiful church with a parsonage about 20
kilometres away from Casamari. The priest did not live there and he
would inform the priest of his decision to lend me these quarters and
tell him that he was still the pastor of the parish. He should view me
as an assistant priest and allow me to live in the empty parsonage and
read Mass in church.
I thanked the bishop and rented a small truck that
took me and my belongings to the parish’s parsonage. The priest was
overjoyed about his Bishop's decision and reserved only the paid
liturgical services for himself, such as: baptisms, weddings, burials.
The other services fell to me: Catechism, visiting the ill, Sundays
Mass, etc. This small parish, named Arpino, consisted of only
about 10 families. They owned wheat fields and fruit plantations.
It was farmers who only owned some beasts of burden, a chicken coop and
a rabbit stall, but prosperous people. Arpino has a small restaurant.
The church has an old Sexton, who seems very nice. Certainly I had to
pay for my needs, but I was given gifts: Eggs, milk, etc!
I spent happy days with the small flock there. I was
their second shepherd and I believed that Arpino would be my last
residence in this world. However, the future that providence provided
for me, approached with fast steps! One year and a few months had
passed: During this pause, I had met many people, and my parsonage
overflowed with gifts: a very new kitchen, a refrigerator that kept the
purchases cool that I took care to purchase each week in the city. It
was also named Arpino, half an hour away on foot; but the time was
decreased to a few minutes if my parish children drove to the city by
car and invited me to ride along.
I made friends with people from the Religious Orders
and also the Archpriest in this city. He invited me to perform the main
celebrations, particularly the celebration of the Holy Virgin's
Assumption into heaven. A religious celebration followed with an
extensive banquet. I also returned home with the payment for a
Pontifical Mass in my pocket. I was invited quite often by the
Bishop. Every Sunday people were keen on inviting me for lunch. These
friendships seemed always loyal to me. But the thunderstorm approached
on the vigil of Christmas. It was around midday, while I was preparing
the manger for the feast—the first manger in Arpino. I placed great
value on the nativity scene and had sacrificed several thousand Liras
to purchase it because I knew it would be a unique attraction for my
children in catechism instruction. These children’s eyes bulged as they
stood around me, their mouths gaping open as I showed them the small
Jesus, His mother Mary and St. Joseph. I showed them a corner in
the caravan of the Holy Three Kings and they stood on their tiptoes and
observed the wonderful star. It was simple to make God's inexhaustible
love comprehensible for them, who out of love for us turned into a
small child. It was unnecessary to prove the existence of the
angels to them who sang "Gloria in excelsis" with wide opened
mouths. These farm children knew the shepherds, who were similar
to their brothers and the sheep that formed their small herds. The very
white haired St. Joseph resembled our old Sexton. The manger, a
splendid invention by Frances of Assisi, is real experience and
appropriate catechism for children. I was not sorry about my
small fortune that was used for the purchase of this beautiful
manger. Then a priest came to me, one I had met before in Ecône,
Switzerland. He told me outright: "Excellency, the Holy Virgin sends me
in order for me to send you to central Spain immediately to render her
a service. My car is ready for you at the parsonage's door and we
will depart immediately depart in order to be there for Christmas."
Stunned by this invitation, I said to him: "If it is
a service that the Holy Virgin required, I am ready to follow you to
the end of the world, but I must inform the priest because of the
Christmas Mass and must pack my bag. Meanwhile, since it was soon
midday, go to the village restaurant and get something to eat."
He replied to me: "There are three of us in the car and we do not even
have a cent with which to buy a cup of coffee." I told him:
"All three of you go; I will pay for your lunch." A lunch that
cost me 3,000 Liras.
In order to reach Palmar de Troya, I would have
spent 50,000 Liras for gas and meals. While I nibbled on a piece of
bread, they ate well. I called the Sexton and asked him to inform the
priest about Christmas Mass. I told him that I would immediately go to
France because of urgent family matters and would return promptly in
two weeks...
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