Rob Colquhoun

Taking St Gregory Nazianzen’s reading from the Advent office of readings into account.
Part 1 – GIFT OF SELF

St Gregory contemplates on the person of Christ, and his mission and salvation. He states “He who enriches others becomes poor” and “he who emptied himself of his Godhead for a brief time so that I might share in his goodness.” Gregory states the supremacy of giving over receiving, taught to us by Christ. Christ has told us that he who loses his life shall find it (Luke) and that it is better to give than to receives (Acts). It is through the gift of self to others one truly finds oneself. How are we to give to others? Through service, love, care, humility and sacrifice. Within a community context this is particularly apparent and relevant. For the majority of people the gift of oneself is through marriage. For those aspiring towards Priesthood, a closer and more intimate union with Christ is called for, to follow him closely in the liturgical year, to listen and talk to him everyday and be aware of our wrongdoings, enlighten our consciences and our hearts. Benedict XVI has told us earlier in his pontificate, “Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes away nothing and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive one hundredfold in return.” The Cure of Ars said famously, “The priesthood is the love of the heart of Jesus.” With priesthood, hearts are particularly linked to the gift of self. Pure hearts radiate with love for God, and neighbour, sanctify the world and help to inaugurate the kingdom of God. Rotten hearts succumb to failure, produce bad fruit and are unpleasing to God.

Part 2- SACRIFICE, RELATIONSHIP, HOLINESS THROUGH CHRIST

Later on in the second office of readings, St. Gregory says, “It was necessary that holiness be conferred on man through the humanity God took to himself,” and “The Good Shepard, lays down his life for his sheep.” We need to lay down our lives… our selfish desires, our egoism, our pettiness and aspire towards pleasing God. Many of us are extremely privileged to form and develop an intimate relationship with Christ, especially through prayer and sacraments. We need to acknowledge and pray for millions of Christians worldwide living today persecuted and severely discriminated against for their beliefs. Through humility, any sacrifice we make for God is undoubtedly worth it… because God can never be outdone in generosity. Affirmation for others, denial or mortification can help us to achieve this. The martyrs of the Church literally followed our Lord by laying down their lives. We cannot take our faith for granted and we must follow in the footsteps of the people of God by proclaiming the Gospel in our words, actions and our holiness.

Reading St Gregory Nazianzen
The wonder of the Incarnation
The very Son of God, older than the ages, the invisible, the incomprehensible, the incorporeal, the beginning of beginning, the light of light, the fountain of life and immortality, the image of the archetype, the immovable seal, the perfect likeness, the definition and word of the Father: he it is who comes to his own image and takes our nature for the good of our nature, and unites himself to an intelligent soul for the good of my soul, to purify like by like. He takes to himself all that is human, except for sin. He was conceived by the Virgin Mary, who had been first prepared in soul and body by the Spirit; his coming to birth had to be treated with honour, virginity had to receive new honour. He comes forth as God, in the human nature he has taken, one being, made of two contrary elements, flesh and spirit. Spirit gave divinity, flesh received it.
He who makes rich is made poor; he takes on the poverty of my flesh, that I may gain the riches of his divinity. He who is full is made empty; he is emptied for a brief space of his glory, that I may share in his fullness. What is this wealth of goodness? What is this mystery that surrounds me? I received the likeness of God, but failed to keep it. He takes on my flesh, to bring salvation to the image, immortality to the flesh. He enters into a second union with us, a union far more wonderful than the first.
Holiness had to be brought to man by the humanity assumed by one who was God, so that God might overcome the tyrant by force and so deliver us and lead us back to himself through the mediation of his Son. The Son arranged this for the honour of the Father, to whom the Son is clearly obedient in all things.
The Good Shepherd, who lays down his life for the sheep, came in search of the straying sheep to the mountains and hills on which you used to offer sacrifice. When he found it, he took it on the shoulders that bore the wood of the cross, and led it back to the life of heaven.
Christ, the light of all lights, follows John, the lamp that goes before him. The Word of God follows the voice in the wilderness; the bridegroom follows the bridegroom’s friend, who prepares a worthy people for the Lord by cleansing them by water in preparation for the Spirit.
We need God to take our flesh and die, that we might live. We have died with him, that we may be purified. We have risen again with him, because we have died with him. We have been glorified with him, because we have risen again with him.

Last week from 16^th-20^th November my parents came to Spain and we had a great time visiting Salamanca. We stayed at the Scot’s College and saw the stunning architecture and sights of the town. It is a gem of Spain and far more impressive than Oxford or Cambridge. The Churches are truly stunning and the city centre very pleasant. The plaza mayor is a beautiful setting perfect for the café culture of Spain. As a university town it has a great ambience and relaxed atmosphere. The Dominican Cathedral was were preachers were first sent out to Evangelise the Americas. I would recommend anyone to visit, and especially in November when there are no tourists there. The city gives an image of the previous glory of the Spanish empire. 

If our love is overwhelming and in abundance then we can give our love to as many as possible due to the fact that there is a sustaining resource within us- a resource which we can have a large amount of. The holy spirit can inspire us to be faithful and to care, walk with, sustain and help others. The gift of oneself to others is possible for a person who can is willing to love, care, nurture, listen and understand others. Generosity, kindness and compassion are all virtuous qualities that are ingredients of holiness.

Every single person has an influence on others. Every positive mood has the opportunity to bring happiness, kindness and goodness to another person, which in turn, will help that person to imitate those affections to others. Likewise, negative actions and comments spread to others and can bring despair, division and hurt. Negativity does not bring out creativity and it is virtually impossible to have anything productive out of negative words or actions. A double negative might be neutral in implication. But honesty is also important and therefore being sycophantically positive does not necessarily help when being polite. Therefore there are also times, when the truth may hurt but it may lead to fraternal correction. But on the whole, being positive is a characteristic that people warm to and it helps to bring out the best in people. It is closely linked to optimism, creativity and hope.

The teaching of Christ according to particular religions

Christ’s position in religions other than Christianity is particularly striking.

Within mainstream Judaism, a Christ figure is anticipated according to the prophets.

Within Islam, Christ is acknowledged as a very important prophet and Mary is also recognized.

Within Sikhism, Christ is recognized as a kind of prophet.

Within polytheism, it’s feasible that he could be added on and worshipped without too many problems.

Yet within Christianity, which holds to the most authentic and real accounts of him (the Gospels), he is worshipped and venerated to who he really was, the Son of God.

Political legislation and governments work from the top down, initiating policy and transmitting it through institutions and structures to reach people in society. Law develops and is universally applicable but in reality it is never fully conformed to. Most political legislation is to influence an already existing problem, for example the French created new laws with regards to the many riots in Paris suburbs. Therefore legislation tends to be reactionary in nature and not visionary. In other words, legislation tends to attempt to keep society on a straight path, but it does not always set the direction.

            Working on a cultural level and on a local level immediately one is involved with people and not theory. It is on this level that the direction is set. Many have commented on the media’s influence on government- the media is a starting point for culture and its influence can be enormous. Many lobbying groups, as well as working on the political level can help by being involved in concrete situations on the ground level. From the bottom up, society can be changed, too.

            Many pro life initiatives in Britain focus on political realities, but at the heart of Britain’s anti-life mentality and teenage pregnancies is the cultural diet of teenagers. Addressing that and the substantial influence that culture has over behaviour is a direct way to influence society. If you change language, you change thought. If you can change thought, you can change action. And if you can change action, you can change the world.

Prayer of Abandonment

Father,

I abandon myself into your hands;

Do with me what you will.

Whatever you may do,

I thank you:

I am ready for all,

I accept all.

Let only your will be done in me,

and in all your creatures.

I wish no more than this, O Lord.

Into your hands I commend my soul;

I offer it to you

with all the love of my heart,

for I love you, Lord,

and so need to give myself,

to surrender myself into your hands,

without reserve,

and with boundless confidence,

for you are my Father,

Blessed Charles de Foucauld.

Charles De Foucauld - by Robert Colquhoun, Joe Kendall and David Doran.

Charles was born into an aristocratic family in 1858. He was orphaned at 6 years of age and put under the care of his maternal grandfather. He lost his faith at 16 years of age. He went to military school in 1876, and was reported to be lazy and undisciplined. In 1880 he was sent with the army to Algeria, and was dismissed. One year later he returned and was an excellent officer. In 1882, he learned Arabic and Hebrew and travelled clandestinely through Morocco, risking his life and published a book on his return in France. At this point Charles, after being unsettled by the silence of the desert began to consider religion. He began to pray by saying, “God, if you exist, make yourself known to me.”


Charles de Foucauld
Conversion-Nazareth

So Charles is starting to calm down and leave behind him the excesses of youth; his life is becoming more sober and ascetic. He rebuilt relationships with family members on return to France and at this time he was asking questions about spirituality and the inner life. He still had no faith but he used to say, upon entering churches and at other times, ‘God, if you exist, make yourself known to me.’ As we shall see later, he came to understand love in terms of desire so perhaps the love of God was working already in him here in giving him this desire to know God.

Charles’ niece, Marie de Bondy, had introduced him to Abbé Huvelin of the Church of St Augustine in Paris and it was here at the end of October 1886 that he went to seek instruction in the faith. Abbé Huvelin immediately invited him to celebrate Reconciliation which he did and then received Communion. He wrote later (August 1901) that once he believed in God he knew he could do nothing else but live for him. From 1887 to 1888 he lived with his family and considered what God was asking of him.

Charles visited the Holy Land between December 1888 and January 1889, a crucial and pivotal point in his life. This pilgrimage, especially the visit to Nazareth, made a strong impression on him. Here he saw that ‘Jesus took the lowest place in a way no-one has ever been able to take away from him.’ He became fascinated by the mystery of Incarnate love, and this mystery expressed in the mystery of the Visitation and the hidden life of Jesus the worker.

With these lasting impressions he returned to France convinced he had a calling to live out for himself the ‘hidden life.’ On the streets of Nazareth he had trodden the same streets as Jesus and had discovered the ‘humble and hidden existence of the divine workman of Nazareth.’ But why did Charles see it as his calling to imitate this humble and hidden existence? One might surmise that at his ‘conversion’ that day with Abbé Huvelin, he had received a grace that made his heart become inflamed with love. What was this love? Shortly before his death he characterised love as ‘not feeling that we love but desiring to love.’ Had this been the longing in his heart when he made his confession and received Communion? He wrote to a school friend in 1902: ‘Imitation is inseparable from love, you know, whoever loves wishes to imitate. It is the secret of my life. I have lost my heart to Jesus of Nazareth crucified 1900 years ago, and I spend my life trying to imitate him as much as I can despite my weakness.’

Charles thought that the Cistercians of the Strict Order, the Trappists, would be the place where he could lead this imitation but his association with the Order would not seem to have been a happy one, at least for Charles. On 15th October he entered the monastery of Notre Dame des Neiges, in France. The plain and simple life here was obviously not plain and simple enough for Charles so he went to a poorer monastery in Akbes, Syria. This might have been closer geographically to the place he longed for, Nazareth, but still he was not happy and felt he was not imitating the hidden life. It is here that Charles drafts some initial rules for an order he might found; indeed he is thinking now of leaving the order and requests to be dispensed of his vows. The Order was not ready to let him go just yet, or perhaps one could say more charitably that they thought he was not yet ready to leave them. However, one could argue that they do not do exactly the best thing to try to keep him by sending him to Rome for further study. He was sent there in October 1896 but by the New Year he was given permission by his Prior to leave.

Where does he head for with this freedom? Nazareth, of course. It is what he does here that reveals exactly what he meant by imitating the hidden life of Christ in Nazareth. In Nazareth he went to the Poor Clares’ convent and lived in a shed by the chapel. He was employed as a domestic worker. He tried to be unknown and unnoticed and did everyday work. His life at the convent was marked by solitude, prayer, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, Gospel meditation and humble work.

It is important to remember that he is fascinated by Incarnate Love, that was and is Jesus of Nazareth. God becomes in Nazareth the worker (the carpenter, in most English translations). He was the Son of Mary living the same simple and ordinary life that others did in first century Nazareth, a rather unimportant village, disliked by many fellow countryman, in a region where people spoke a rather strange form of Aramaic, in a troublesome and somewhat remote corner of the Roman Empire. This was not the life of a student in religious orders in the Eternal City at the end of the nineteenth century. God, the all-powerful, in Nazareth, becomes the least of all men and women.

The Holy Land made Charles note too that soon after the Incarnation of Christ, Jesus was taken by his mother to the home where John was to be born. He sees this act very much as part of Jesus’ great work, that is the sanctification of souls, which he begins even before his birth. This act provides Charles with an example for evangelisation which he was later to put into practice. He sees it in this way: Mary allows Jesus to sanctify the souls of her kinswoman and her son by carrying Jesus in silence amongst them. We must do the same by taking the presence of the Lord into the midst of all we meet. We must, so Charles suggests in a meditation on the Visitation, take to these people the Gospel as well but we must preach it by example rather than by word, just as Mary did by visiting Elizabeth and John.

Charles tries to walk in the footsteps of Jesus and does so as a poor craftsmen in humiliation and obscurity. This seems to fit in well with the life-plan he outlines for himself: ‘For me, to always want to be the last in the least of places in order to be as little as my Master was to walk step by step with Him, as a faithful disciple, to be with my God who lived that way all his life and has given me such an example since his birth.’ Lowliness and humility are key to all that Charles tried to do and to be: he exhorts us in a meditation on the Incarnation, ‘Be lowly, lowly, humble, humble.

He lived out his life-plan in the place Jesus who inspired it lived himself, for three years. During this time he was encouraged, little by little, by the sisters and by the man who was still his confessor, Père Huvelin, to follow this lifestyle as a priest. He finally accepted and returned to Notre Dame des Neiges for formation. On 9th June 1901 Charles was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Viviers in the Ardèche and it was as a diocesan priest that he was beatified by the Holy Father on Sunday, 13th November 2005.

Spiritual and Human Development 2005 – 2006

Presentation 2 – Charles de Foucauld
(His Life and Spirituality in the Desert)

By David Doran

I have lost my heart to this Jesus of Nazareth, crucified 1900 years ago, and I spend my life trying to imitate him as far as my weakness permits. – Charles de Foucauld

It was during his last retreats before entering Holy Orders that Brother Charles came to understand the implications of his vocation to the priesthood. The wish of his Heavenly Father and the specific whisper of the Holy Spirit invited him to live as Jesus of Nazareth, the Good Shepherd (Jn 10:11), amongst a forsaken flock.

The cornerstone of Charles’ spirituality was the moving, breathing, living Gospel. He wrote to his bishop stating that he believed that as a priest, it was his responsibility to follow Jesus, and bring the Divine Banquet, not to his friends and relations, but to the forlorn souls who have no priest. This is a Gospel imperative from Saint Luke, taken literally in the same sense as Saint Francis understood the evangelical counsels:

“When you give a lunch or dinner, do not invite your friends or brothers or neighbours or your relations or rich neighbours, incase they invite you back and so repay you. No; when you have a party, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, then you will be blessed, for they have no means to repay you and so you will be repaid when the upright rise again.” (Lk 14: 12-14)

Charles had served in the army and been an explorer in Morocco and Algeria. He knew Morocco was as large as France with 10 million people and no priest. He knew that Algeria was larger than France and had perhaps 12 missionaries. Therefore he moved to the Algerian Sahara in 1902 on the Moroccan frontier where there was no priest for 400km.

In the desert at Beni-Abbes Charles built a hermitage out of mud bricks and palm trunks. In the hermitage there was a chapel. He marked out the limit of his enclosure with stones. There was no fence. In such a way he was able to allow the poorest of the poor to come to him. He saw his mission as one of a cloistered life around the Blessed Sacrament offering hospitality to all – good, bad, friend, foe, Muslim, Christian.

One of the things that surprised Charles was the way in which God was leading him. He did not get much peace in the desert since he was the only one in the hermitage to lodge and feed the people who came to him. There were sometimes as many as 100 visitors a day. Charles said that he was led from a life of contemplation to a life of ministry by the needs of the people he encountered. In a beautiful inversion of Jesus’ Parable of the Lost Sheep in Saint Luke’s Gospel (Lk 15: 4-7) Charles explained that he must not leave the 99 sheep who have gone astray to stay serenely in the fold with the 1 sheep.

The local Bishop recognised the good that Charles was having and urged Charles into a more missionary life. That is proclaiming the Good News with words. However the Living Gospel of Charles’ spirituality allows the light of Christ to shine forth in a more fundamental way. The Living Gospel is an expression of the Incarnation. Perhaps the best way to think about this is in respect of the 3rd Luminous Mystery – the Proclamation of the Kingdom of God and Call to Conversion. The mystery tells us that in recognising Jesus we are set free by Him. It is this freedom that enables us to be changed. This change we experience is the recognition of the image and likeness of God in ourselves and our neighbours as revealed in the life of Gods beloved Son, the Incarnate Word. Or as Charles would put it: we move closer to God through the practice of the Hidden Life of Jesus of Nazareth.

How did Charles move towards a Hidden Life in imitation of Jesus of Nazareth? The most influential Gospel reading for Charles was the eschatological parable found in Saint Matthew:

“Whatever you did to the least of these you did to me.” (Mt 25:40)

Charles was immersed in a socially accepted norm – namely slavery. It is very much as we live our lives today with abortion, stem cell research and the clamour for euthanasia. Human beings treating other human beings as raw materials. The slaves worked palm plantations, were beaten daily, underfed and underclothed. Charles believed that the Church should not be involved in worldly government but was passionately of the belief that it was a great sin to be a useless shepherd by not working for those under his care affected by such blasphemous injustice.

“In truth I tell you, in so far as you neglected to do this to one of the least of these, you did it to me.” (Mt 25:45)

He recognised the pitfalls of not being a faithful shepherd – he saw his own timidity and cowardice. Nevertheless he asked the Bishop to intervene. The Bishop told him he must be prudent in his zeal. Charles submitted to his Bishops decision. It was this submission that brought him closer in solidarity to the poorest of the poor. Charles had found his forsaken flock – he would live his life with them just as the Carpenter of Nazareth lived his life. In humble, insignificant, hidden service.

Charles heard of a road being opened up to Toureg country in the Hoggar region of Algeria. Charles had heard of a woman who had prevented Toureg tribesmen from finishing off wounded French soldiers, took them back to her house and cared for them. In this Charles recognised the love of neighbour, all neighbours. He decided to go to the Tuareg where there was no priest. It was a great wrench since his life at Beni-Abbes had become familiar and comfortable.

In 1904 he reached the Hoggar region after a 4 month journey through the desert. He again saw this move as leading the Life of Jesus of Nazareth – to be poor, to be little, to be unknown. He moved to Tamanrasset in the mountains. He began learning the Tuareg language and worked on a translation of the Gospel into the Tuareg language. He said that he can do no good for the Tuaregs except by speaking with them and knowing their language. But this was not an esoteric study – he learned their culture, their poems, their campfire songs. Just as the Gospel was active, alive in his life his life was active and alive with the people he came to serve.

Did this make Charles a living saint? Not at all. He speaks of his own coldness, his prayers being lukewarm and of his banal passionless life! Like everyone he felt his isolation and felt depressed. He wrote to Abbe Huvelin in 1908 stating that is was 21 years since his conversion and that there was no harvest, no fruit. He thought of himself as a failure.

There was drought in the Hoggar in 1907. It had lasted 17 months. The country lived on milk but the goats were dying because there was no water. Eventually Charles became very ill – he became one of the poor. He could not give to others, he could not help others. Others had to give to him, others had to help him and he had to receive. It was the Tuareg who saved him by giving what little milk they had during the drought. In this way the people he came to serve kept him alive.

This event cemented the trust between Charles and the Tuareg. This trust was the foundation of their friendship. All friends give to one another and receive from one another. Charles was serving God through an Apostleship of Friendship. He said that his apostleship was based on goodness and that when people see him they should say “if this man is good, his religion must be good” (Carnet de Tamanrasset, p188). Charles even went so far as to learn to crochet and knit on one of his trips to France. He passed this onto the Tuareg women.

When in Nazareth he had meditated on Jesus’ words to the daughter of Jairus: “Give her something to eat”. Charles believed that to be a living neighbour we should pay attention to the small details of life by the practice of active consolation and tenderness to others. He was trying to evangelise through an apostleship of friendship. This led him to establish the Union of Brothers and Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Charles wrote that the practice of genuine virtue is attractive and can draw people to God. He envisaged the new organisation as treating all people as brothers and sisters, again in the literal sense, just as Jesus stated in the Gospel:

“You are all brothers and sisters since you have only one father and he is in heaven”.

In 1914 the First World War broke out. Charles thought that he might be useful as an army chaplain or even a stretcher bearer but he was told to stay where he was by a military friend. With the French needing troops on the Western Front the troop garrisons in Algeria were reduced. This enabled raiding parties from Morocco and Libya to threaten the Hoggar region of Algeria and the Tuareg people who Charles served. Charles built a fortress for the Tuareg to use and at the request of his friends and neighbours took up residence there in 1916.

On the 1st December 1916 a group of Tuareg rebels arrived at Tamarasset with the intention of looting the fortress and taking Charles hostage. Charles recognised one of the men in the raiding party and opened the door to him. Charles was immediately seized and tied up. However the raid was bungled because some men turned up and the 15 year old boy, who was guarding Charles panicked, shooting him at point blank range. Charles was killed instantly.

Whilst in Nazareth Charles had meditated on the death of Jesus and saw that Jesus offered the wicked no resistance and went to his death in silence. Charles desired this type of death because it would be like Jesus’ prayer to the Father – the supreme act of pure love. He hoped for a martyrdom, not in the eyes of people, but in the eyes of God. His silent death would be in the very likeness of Jesus’ own death on the cross - a sacrifice made for the love of God.

Charles had written to Abbe Huvelin in 1908 that he was 50 years old and had accomplished nothing. Yet he always had of the Gospel promise in Saint John in mind that:

“Unless a wheat of grain falls on the ground and dies, it remains only a single grain. But if it dies, it yields a rich harvest” (Jn 12:34)

Quietly and in obscure humility following, Jesus of Nazareth, to whom he said he “had lost his heart to”, Brother Charles, “as the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep” (Jn 10:11), gave his life in perfect love


Overall, Charles lived the spirituality of the humble and poor labourer of Nazereth. He sought the humility of the incarnation, following the obscurity of 30 years of Christ’s life. Following his conversion along the path of a penintent, his had a great power of faith and power of prayer and in the desert he lived a life similar to John the Baptist.

His spirituality had a sense of universal brotherhood. He sought to treat every person as a friend, with a special love for strangers at Tamanrasset. He was partilularly opposed to slavery in his writings and followed St John Chrysotom as he believed in the inseperability of the altar and the neighbour. His prescence in a Muslim country and the inculturation of the Gospel that he sought without imposition is particularly relevant for our age. His pioneering approach towards inter religious dialogue was way before its time and he was a witness to tolerance. Above all he had a zeal and commitment to prayer, faith and Eucharistic love, his commitment to the Church and vigour help to explain that despite the lack of human achievements, his spirituality has inspired in time thousands of others. The focus on Gospel orientation, poverty, solitude, humble work, self effacement show us a path of the most perfect possible imitation of the life of our Lord Jesus of Nazareth. He chose to share suffering with the victims of poverty and his relentless and passionate faith helped to show his contemporaries that witness can show people the path to God.

A timeline of the life of Blessed Charles de Foucauld

15th September 1858 Born, Strasbourg, to an aristocratic family
1864 Parents die. Charles and younger sister go to live with grandparents
1870 Franco-Prussian war. France lose Alsace-Lorraine to Germany. Family move to Nancy. Charles educated by Jesuits
c. 1874 Charles identifies his loss of faith
1876 Enters Saint Cyr military academy
1879 Graduates, 87th in class. Garrisoned in Pont-à-Mousson
1880 Regiment sent to Algeria. Charles dismissed after refusing to give up a mistress whom he had passed off as his wife. Returned to Evian
1881 Joined a new regiment having left his mistress. Now in South Oran
1882 Requested discharge to go on a scientific expedition to Morocco. Learned to speak Hebrew and Arabic
June 1883-May 1884 Travelled through Morocco disguised a rabbi
1884 Proposed to marry in Algeria but broke off the engagement after opposition from family
1885 Received medal from the French Geographic Society for the Moroccan expedition
1885-1886 Travelled round South Algeria and Tunisia looking for oases
1886 Returned to France. Rebuilt relations with family. Published a book about his travels.
October 1886 Went to Saint Augustine Church in Paris and received the Sacraments from Abbé Huvelin
1887-1888 Lived with family and considered a religious vocation
December 1888-1889 Visited the Holy Land
15th January 1890 Enters the Trappist Monastery of Notre Dame des Neiges
July 1890 Goes to monastery on Akbes in Syria
October 1896 Sent to Rome to study
January 1897 Given permission to leave the order and follow his own vocation
March 1897 Went to live and work at the Poor Clares’ convent in Nazareth
1900 Returned to Notre Dame des Neiges for final formation for the priesthood
9th June 1901 Ordained a priest for the Diocese of Viviers (in the Ardèche)
September 1901 Returned to Algeria. Settled in Beni-Abbes and built a hermitage there
1902 Alerted friends and the authorities to the evils of slavery and worked to free salves
1903 Left for the Hoggar Region, Algeria
1905 Made several trips to the Tuareg and began to learn their language. Wrote for them a catechism and began to translate the Gospel into their language
1906 Joined by a companion, Br Michael, but he became ill after a short while and returned to France
July 1907 Began to study the Tuareg language more fully. Eventually given permission to celebrate Mass but not expose the Blessed Sacrament
January 1908 Became seriously ill after a drought. Tuareg kept him alive
1909, 1911, 1913 Three trips to France to present his proposed rules for an order
1914 War broke out in France. Charles stayed in Tamanrasset
1915 Riots in the Desert. Moroccan Rezzous and Libyan Senoussites threaten the Tuareg
1916 Built a small fortress in Tamanrasset to protect the Tuareg
1st December 1916 Charles was killed by a stray bullet fired by his captors in their panic. His body was hastily buried in a ditch.

Nicaragua Workcamp 2005 - Summary -- Thoughts

This summer I travelled to Nicaragua, one of the poorest countries in the northern hemisphere. It was a trip to work on a project building a school and latrines with a group of 15 people organised from a Non Government Association and halls of residence in London. We also had a collection of doctors join our team of 15. After much fundraising with many projects, we set off to Diriamba, a town one hour from the capital.

The poverty of the country was most striking in the side of the town where we were working. It was not recognised as a barrio (neighbourhood) by the local authorities and therefore received very little basic amenities. Some of the poorest ‘houses’ were constructed out of very simple materials and were very plain. It was very concerning how many children had swollen bellies (due to malnutrition). This was partly down to poor sanitary conditions, and henceforth at the end of 2 weeks we had successfully built 6 new latrines, nearly 3 metres deep for 6 new families. This would help to ensure at least some basics conditions for some of the town.

Undoubtedly the legacy of decades of political corruption had left serious reparations to be paid on Nicaraguan society. Yet nevertheless it was extremely surprising to see the joy and happiness of so many people despite the mundane neighbourhood and at times squalid parts. It was a great testimony to hope that so many could be happy, even happier than many of my western counterparts. Happiness is not necessarily to be found in ones immediate environment, nor status or position in society. These people proved that happiness transcends one’s physical existence.

Part of the trip made me reflect deeply on homes and habitats. With the marriage between finance and homes firmly established in the UK, many people have become deluded and obsessed about houses, mortgages and property in an aura of self assertion and a want of possession. Although there are many other motives in the acquisition of property including financial sense, commuting has increased and communities have been destroyed as a result of the property boom of the late 1990s to today. Security is to be measured by the status of one’s mortgage and the full ownership of one’s house ensures that one has reached salvation from the chains of rent. Although the property boom has also been created difficult planning regulations and smaller families using houses, it is clear that greed has also played its part on the property boom. The problem with possessions is that if they are too closely possessed they end up possessing the possessor! But for those obsessed with the worship of property could only come to Nicaragua to see the joy of people who have such simple homes and have placed their emphasis in life on family, love, relationships and stability I am sure that their values would immediately be changed. Overall, the meaning of a home should not be distorted by finance. In one extreme, property itself has become expensive and has developed into a financial instrument rather that its first function as a house. On the other extreme, property is at times impossible to create due to the lack of money for resources.

The basic nature of many of the houses in the poor barrios in Diriamba made it clear that poverty and a lack of a basic home seriously compromised the dignity of these Nicaraguans as living in seriously poor conditions was not only detrimental to their health, it was a situation that did not look like improving soon. A basic habitat enabling clean water, respectable sanitation, shelter from the elements is a clear prerequisite if one is to respect the dignity of the person. However, these qualities (such as health, quality of habitat) cannot be measured in tangible terms and therefore this is very difficult to define. One of the flaws of the MDGs (Millennium Development Goals) was that it attempted to create goals in areas which cannot properly or accurately be measured. I didn’t see too many people walking around the Barrios with clipboards ticking the houses which were now living above the poverty line.

Nevertheless, the serious poverty of many in the town of Diriamba made me reflect that due to the finite resources in the world, disparity in wealth therefore gave the responsibility to the rich to make the world a fairer place. Given the abject failure of the Sandinista regime and the horrific disaster of many communist regimes worldwide, fair, honest and just political action would have to be given to Nicaragua in order for it to improve its living conditions. This would have to occur from both national and international politics and development policies.

For more information contact Robert Colquhoun, robert543@gmail.com.