Sister Maria-Seraphica of the Five Wounds, O.SS.R. Of the Monastery of Marienthal (1810 – 1865)

Born Catherine Merckelbach

Sister Maria-Seraphica, [1] in the world Catherine Merckelbach, was born on 7th April 1810 at Wittem, in Dutch Limburg. She was the youngest of the twelve children of Simon Merckelbach, Mayor of the village and the local judge, and Elisabeth Schervier. She lost her father at the age of two; but the intense and pious education that she received from her mother compensated her for this dreadful loss. Moreover, this truly Christian mother exercised the most happy influence over all her children: they were all good Christians; two of them became excellent secular priests, one the Dean of Galoppe, near Wittem, and the other the parish priest of Montzen, in the Diocese of Liege.

Young Catherine, though endowed with precious qualities, was not however without her faults. Her stubbornness went so far one day that she threw the food she had received from her mother onto the ground. An unexpected reprimand punished this misdemeanour. “It would be better,” a solemn voice suddenly said, “it would be better for this child to die rather than remain so capricious.” It was the voice of Catherine’s brother, who had succeeded his father in the position of judge. This severe utterance, pronounced in the presence of the young girl and her mother, made the deepest impression on Catherine. Quite resolved not to die, she became distinguished from then onwards for the politeness of her manners.

And then precious virtues germinated in her heart and promised a wonderful future. A tender piety, a filial fear of God that led her to carefully avoiding the least faults, a sincere and true modesty, joined to her other qualities, soon attracted the eyes of the world to her, but she remained deaf to the advances that were made to her. In 1834, a mission preached by the Redemptorist Fathers at Montzen determined her to give herself totally to God. Finally in 1837, after the death of her mother, she left her own country in spite of the resistance of her family, and entered the Convent of the Redemptoristines in Vienna. This was on 19th October. The 7th January 1839 was the day of her vesting. On 9th January following, she made her profession together with her niece Marie-Xaveria.

* * * * *

Sister Maria-Seraphica began her religious career under the direction of the Venerable Father Joseph Passerat, who was then residing in Vienna. This is to say that she gave herself very particularly to living a life of prayer. Her tender love for the divine Redeemer and His most holy Mother maintained this sweet spirit in her, a true prerogative of the Daughters of Saint Alphonsus, and thence led her efficaciously to the exercise of the virtues. Prayer, the common life, fraternal charity, these three foundations of the religious life, were especially dear to her heart, but to believe her contemporaries (and their witness is impartial), she truly excelled in all the virtues. Only an excessive over-sensitivity of conscience which degenerated into scruples and prevented her from ever becoming Superior threw a light shadow over this scene. But on the other hand, her extraordinary purity of heart profoundly amazed all those who knew her, and one day it even evoked this exclamation from a holy priest: “I have never met so pure a soul!”

Upon this admirable foundation, the fruit of the predilections of the Lord, Sister Maria-Seraphica quietly, but without ever relaxing, elevated her spiritual edifice. Humble and loving humiliation, obliging and sweet towards all her Sisters, always ready for anything and also to take on the tasks that were asked of her, loving to suffer and often without seeking to understand why, she was able to practise the most difficult virtues in an extremely simple and, might one say, monotonous life. She attracted everyone’s regards, while fleeing in horror from any human praise, and was able to deflect the most severe criticism. Was it not true that her fervour, or rather we may say, that her holiness was indeed so extraordinary that it merited from the Sisters eulogies such as the following? – Sister Maria-Seraphica was a mirror of all the virtues.” – “If she was not a saint, I do not know how the saints could have been,” and this other one, more decisive still: “Sister Maria-Seraphica was the living Rule. If you want to know what she did, how she did it, and what she did not do, just read our holy Rules.”

We can add some other features to this scene. Suffering, both interior and exterior, was the assiduous companion of Sister Maria-Seraphica; and she found in the cross one kind of food for her love. She searched for another in the pious dialogues that Saint Alphonsus recommends so vividly to religious souls. Ordinarily little given to talking, she became eloquent whenever anyone broached the subject of the divine love; her looks then betrayed an indefinable happiness, and the picturesque expression of one of the Sisters sums it all up for us: “all the registers of her interior organ seemed drawn in an instant.”

* * * * *

The task of Superior excepted, our good Sister several times fulfilled the most important and difficult tasks in the monastery. She did them to the satisfaction of all the Sisters, as her charity was immense. And so she spent the years of her religious life, first at Vienna, and then after the revolution of 1848, in the new Monastery of Marienthal, near to her birthplace. It was there that the last fifteen years of her life were spent. From 1857, a cancerous tumour in her breast made her suffer some cruel agonies. The illness did nothing but get worse, and death was soon approaching rapidly. On 29th June 1865, they had to give the invalid the last sacraments. Before doing so, the famous Father Bernard Hafkenscheid, Redemptorist, gave the Sisters a sermon in which he was not afraid to propose Sister Maria-Seraphica as a model of religious perfection, and notably, of a marvellous charity. Then he brought the Holy Viaticum to the invalid and fortified her with Extreme Unction. She received these two sacraments with the most fervent piety. She went on living until the 23rd August, giving all her Sisters the most touching examples of resignation. On that day, the Lord conveyed her to the eternal wedding.

After her death, from the hearts of her fellow Sisters and all those who had known her, a chorus of praises was raised. They can be summarized in the words of a former Sister of Ried: “This humble Sister, under the appearance of the most pleasing simplicity, constantly practised all the virtues so well that we may say of her: She has done all things well.” From then on they began to invoke her confidently. One converse novice had become almost entirely deaf following a very severe fever. Praying before the body of the deceased, she asked for her help, and was not afraid to put Sister Maria-Seraphica’s finger into her deaf ear. A noticeable improvement was produced immediately, and the following morning, after experiencing severe pains in her head after communion, she was completely cured.

A Franciscan Sister from Aix-la-Chapelle suffered for six months from a feebleness of nerves and stomach that resisted all the efforts of medicine. Following a novena that she made to Sister Maria-Seraphica, and swallowing a little piece of her vestment every day, she found herself not just cured of her illness, but suddenly as robust as if she had never suffered. The doctor himself recognized this fact as humanly inexplicable.

Many similar facts, both spiritual and temporal, were recollected by the companions of the pious deceased, and they continue always, in the Monastery of Marienthal, to confidently invoke the humble Sister whom the Lord glorified in so touching a manner.

Footnotes

[1] See “The Life and Virtues of Sister Maria Seraphica of the holy Five Wounds written by one of her fellow Sisters” [Leben und Tugenden der Schwester Maria Seraphika von den hl. Fünf Wunden beschrieben von einer ihrer Mitschwestern], Marienthal 1884.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Sister Marie-Raphael of the Five Wounds, O.SS.R. of the Monastery of Marienthal (1791 – 1861)

Born Julienne Wold

Sister Marie-Raphael was born at Stein, in Upper Austria, on 6th January 1791. Her family were pious Christians, favoured by the gifts of fortune. One of her sisters entered the Carmelite Order. At first, Julienne, the youngest, did not feel the least inclined towards religious life, and her rare beauty inspired in her a vanity no less rare. But God, who wanted her for Himself alone, sent her various trials when she was quite young – first of all dropsy, then smallpox, which left her with numerous marks afterwards. And finally, she remained undersized and even a little deformed.

All this provided her with material for great sacrifices; but, although she was pious and good, she was still not yet convinced of the vanity of the world. The example of her sister brought her to confess herself to a Redemptorist Father, and this was the means which God used to attract her closer to Himself. Not that she greatly esteemed the sons of Saint Alphonsus. On the contrary, she had a sort of aversion for them, caused by the calumny that the hatred of the wicked had poured out against Saint Clement Marie Hofbauer and his disciples. So she never wished to be confessed by this great Servant of God, but after his death, she repented and set herself to following the direction given to her by the Redemptorists very faithfully. And when they told her about the Institute of the Redemptoristines, she felt herself drawn to ask for admission.

* * * * *

Different circumstances prevented her, however, including the question of knowing if this Order would ever obtain the Imperial authorisation, for which influential persons had made approaches for a long time, but with no success. The young lady was bold enough to ask for an audience with the Emperor Francis. Admitted into his presence, she asked him for the authorisation she desired so much, explaining to him point by point the reasons that Father Petrack, her confessor, and the Venerable Father Passerat had suggested to her. The Emperor replied to her with great goodness and assured her that he would take the matter in hand. She curtseyed, and she had hardly left the apartment when she remembered with alarm that she had forgotten a point. Without hesitating, she returned to the audience chamber and explained to the Emperor, who was still there, the point she had forgotten. The point was that her parents would not give her permission to enter the Order unless the Imperial authorisation was obtained. We can say immediately, that when the Emperor had signed the Decree authorising the Redemptoristine Institute in Austria at Pressburg on 11th November 1830, he had it sent, not to the Community of the Sisters, but to young Julienne who was still in the world, and it was she who gave it to the Sisters.

While waiting for the Emperor to keep his promise, Julienne learnt everything she thought would be useful in her future state of life. She even learnt the Latin language so that she would be able to understand the Divine Office. Finally, after an interruption of eighteen months, during which she had to care for her father in his last illness, she entered the Convent and received the habit and the name of Marie-Joseph-Raphael of the Five Wounds. The name of Joseph was given to her in addition because of her great devotion to this good Saint. In the month of January 1835, she made her profession and applied herself with redoubled fervour to all the exercises of religious life.

What distinguished her especially, with her love of regular observance, was her profound and sincere humility. She always considered herself the least worthy of God’s graces and judged herself useless at everything, so consequently she always chose the most humble tasks for herself. Inspired by a great spirit of penance, she practised severe mortifications, in spite of her delicate health, and her frequent migraines did not prevent her from always refusing any exception. Hard on herself, she was sweet and charitable towards her Sisters. Her concern for them was so great that she would even lose sleep over them, especially in her position as Mistress of Educandes, which she held for a long time. Always very conscientious in the use of her time, she never forgot, in spite of her great activity, to be closely united to God by continual prayer.

* * * * *

She was in the position of Mother Vicar when the Revolution of 1848 broke out. Forced to take refuge with her brother, she would soon have succumbed to privations and especially to the grief of being separated from her Sisters, if God had not opened the way to asylum for her at Marienthal in Holland. Back in her own element, she re-established herself and was once again, for the space of twelve years, the model of the Community, especially for her charity full of condescension, her humility and her love of her own abjectness. In spite of her indispositions, she continued to take part in community acts, even recreation, which she held quite correctly as a very important act of religious life. In her last years she suffered greatly in her legs. For three years, because of them she lost sleep almost completely.

So drained of her strength little by little, Sister Marie-Raphael ardently desired to be united forever with her heavenly Spouse. Whenever she learnt of the deaths of priests or Sisters younger than herself, she would envy their fate and wonder why God still left her in this world, she who was useless at everything. But God does not always judge like men. The hour of her deliverance finally arrived. On 25th January 1861, Sister Marie-Raphael received the holy Viaticum. “Come, O my Jesus, delay no longer!” she cried aloud. She often repeated this prayer until her death. On 27th, at about 9 pm in the evening, she rendered up her beautiful soul, while pronouncing the name of Jesus.

She was in her seventieth year.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Mother Marie-Celestine of the Five Wounds, O.SS.R. Foundress of the Monastery of Marienthal at Wittem (1808 - 1878)

Born Cecile Stenitzer

Cecile Stenitzer was the youngest of fourteen children that God granted her good parents. She was born in Upper Styria, in Austria, on 30th September 1808, at Gös, a short distance away from Leoben, where her parents retired to later. One of her brothers died at the age of twelve. While the pious child was in his agony, his mother sat beside his bed and wept. Suddenly the child told her, “Don’t weep, mother, but get up quickly. Can’t you see the beautiful Lady entering here?” As soon as he spoke these words he died, leaving behind the sweet hope that he had seen the Queen of the Angels appearing to him.

Cecile herself owed a great deal to Mary’s protection. One day she swallowed a piece of lead and found herself in the most perilous state. Her mother immediately promised to make a pilgrimage in honour of the Blessed Virgin, and she was fortunate enough to be able to take the piece of metal out of her daughter’s throat that was choking her. Another time Cecile was out on the street and was knocked down by a horse, but she did not receive the least injury.

She made her first communion at the age of nine, but without the necessary preparation. In fact, we can only say that Christian life was languishing in Leoben at this time. Those who should have been instructing the faithful and leading them to good were of a distressing tepidness, and although Cecile’s parents were not lacking in piety, they were too immersed in the affairs of the world to be able to supervise the education of their children very actively. Then the worries of the household, the crowd of visitors and the great number of domestic servants were for Cecile the cause of a great number of distractions and impressions harmful to her soul. She said later on, “I did not see too much good, but rather too much evil, and the worst was that I was led into not seeing it as such.” Add to this her outgoing and jovial nature, and her pleasant manners, and it can be seen how great the peril was to which she was exposed.

However, God had chosen her for Himself. She often experienced a strong attraction for solitude, and the desire to pray and weep over the frivolities of her youth. Even then she was filled with a tender devotion for the Five Wounds of Our Lord, and every evening, before taking her repose, she was in the habit of kissing a crucifix suspended above her bed. One evening, weariness made her forget about it, but she suddenly remembered it, and generously breaking with the sleep that was weighing upon her, she got up and devoutly venerated the Saviour’s wounds. This little sacrifice was the first moment when the divine love triumphed in her soul. God in His turn, covered her with His buckler against every seduction and kept her entirely for Himself.

* * * * *

At this time, religious life was very little known in Leoben and even less valued. So it is not astonishing that Cecile thought more about marriage than any other state of life. Moreover, her fortune, her beauty and her lovable character brought her many admirers. Amongst them, two managed to capture the attention of the young girl for quite a time. One day, however, when one of them, having invited her to walk unaccompanied with him, made her a dishonest proposition, she suddenly saw a very fine young man appear, whose presence confounded the tempter. Cecile believed with good reason that it was an apparition of her guardian angel. Another day, a young officer who had been courting her was permitted some liberty, and she cried out and showed him an image of the Blessed Virgin. “No, no! What would the Mother of God and the Child Jesus say?” And she ran away. The officer was sent elsewhere and Cecile was left alone. Later on she said: “I was like a fly hovering above the boiling water without falling in.” Praise be to the mercy of God, we can state here that Cecile kept the lily of her virginity and her baptismal innocence intact until the hour of her death. This is what resulted from her own confession.

However, she was not yet entirely God’s. But then the moment arrived. One evening when she could not get off to sleep, it came to her in spirit that, on the same bed where she was lying, her young niece, aged eight, had died a short time before. Then the thought of death, judgement and hell profoundly pierced her soul. It was as if someone had told her: “If you continue living like this, you will be damned.” The flames and pains of hell, she admitted later, were so vividly represented to me that I was quite overcome and filled with a dreadful fear. I found myself suddenly changed and I resolved to convert myself. In the light of the eternal flames, the truths of the faith appeared to me on that very extraordinary day, and as they had never been shown to me before.

From that moment her resolutions corresponded to the greatness of the grace received. Here are some of them: “Struggle courageously against the inclinations of your nature. – Fast every Friday on bread and water, and take nothing then before evening. – Sleep on a plank on Friday nights. – Every day, for the space of half an hour, deplore the sins you have committed. – Do not eat fruit, except on Sundays. – Pray every evening until midnight. – Never go to the theatre or the ball. – Get rid of all vain objects. – Take the discipline every day, if it is possible. – Attend Mass every day and receive the sacraments often.”

Whatever opinion one may have on these different resolutions, it was the last point that was the most difficult for Cecile, because of the lack of religious spirit that reigned in Leoben, where piety had turned into derision. She was often very distressed to find herself deprived of this support and lack any good spiritual direction. However God was to provide. From Mautern, a locality not far from Leoben, the Redemptorist Fathers would come from time to time into her town, and beginning in 1829, they would descend to the hotel belonging to Cecile’s parents. But she had been warned against them by the public opinion of the people of Leoben, who depicted the “Liguorians” as “fanatics” and would mock anyone who went to be confessed by them, and so at first she hesitated in making use of their ministry.”

Finally she overcame her fear, and although she was exposed to the laughter of the world, she presented herself in the missionaries’ confessional. The first ones she met were the disciples of the blessed Father Clement-Marie Hofbauer. Soon afterwards, it was the venerable Father Joseph Passerat, the Vicar General of the Redemptorists who heard her. She placed herself entirely under his direction and made a general confession to him, and from then on her ideas of religious life became a firm resolution to leave the world and consecrate herself irrevocably to God. It was then that she learned one day from one of her friends that there was a Redemptoristine convent in the capital of Austria. She conceived a vivid desire to enter it, but as soon as she spoke of it, opposition to it burst out from every side. Parents, friends and even the pious people in Leoben rose up against her; the whole town, we might say, conspired against her design. And several times she was forced to absent herself by fleeing from the temptations of seduction. Her mother, who was sixty-six years old, claimed she could not manage without her daughter, who alone was capable of managing the house. Her father refused to give her any part of her inheritance. But Cecile placed her trust in God and was fortified by the decision of Father Passerat who managed to obtain her admission. She separated herself from her weeping family without herself shedding a single tear. This was on 1st June 1829. She was then only 20 years old.

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Scarcely had she entered the convent when God, to purify her, made her severely expiate the pleasures and faults of her past life. The Monastery of Vienna was only a temporary house, and the situation there was precarious, as the Emperor had not yet legally authorised the Institute. The Sisters called themselves Penitent Sisters. But there were many other painful subjects capable of discouraging a less courageous postulant. The Superior, Mother Marie-Alphonse, was French and knew the German language only very imperfectly, and consequently she could converse only slightly with the young postulant placed under her direction. Also, she found herself confined to a very small cell, and she was given the task of patching the vestments. After having been up till then, we might say, the principal object of the attention and esteem of her parents, she who had directed the affairs of her house, now saw herself as if neglected or given tasks which did not in the least seem suitable for her. But the courageous young lady realised that she had not entered the convent with any other aim than triumphing over herself, and she had an unequalled occasion there to carry out her first resolution, that of overcoming all her repugnances. An interior dryness, a terrible disgust, temptations against the faith, all worked to deliver the most horrible assaults upon her, but she held firm in spite of everything, supported by her obedience to her venerable director, who was also prey at this time to the most severe tribulations. Finally the Emperor authorised the Institute (November 1830), and on the following 8th February she received the red habit with ten other novices. And then Father Passerat gave her the significant name of Sister Marie-Celestine of the Five Wounds. Finally, on 2nd October 1832, after a novitiate that the laws of the Empire had prolonged by eight months, she made the entire sacrifice of herself by her religious profession.

It was soon evident how serious her oblation had been after such a long and severe preparation. Named Assistant to the Mistress of Educandes, she was distinguished by her fervour, and her profound and continual recollection, but also by a great goodness and a rare affability. Knowing the human heart very well, she was able to guess the interior struggles that the Sisters had to endure, and address them by means of words of encouragement and consolation. After having fulfilled various tasks, in 1839 she was elected Vicar, and at the canonical election of 1841, the choice of the Sisters made her the Superior. She was only thirty three years old.

Shaken by this unexpected choice, Mother Marie-Celestine was as if choked by her tears, and according to the expression of one of the Sisters present (later Mother Marie-Gabrielle of the Incarnation), she was like a lamb that was led to the slaughter. – Her government was stamped even more with the Spirit of God. The Venerable Father Passerat, who knew her so well and was so good a judge in matters of spirituality, gave this precious testimony of her: “Mother Marie-Celestine has acquitted herself in a perfect manner of all the tasks that have been confided to her.” Returning after her triennium to the exercise of obedience and recollection, she tried to obscure herself entirely and we may say that she was no longer found except in choir or in her cell. It was about this time that with Father Passerat’s consent, she made the vow of always doing what she recognized as being the most perfect.

In 1847, the confidence of the Sisters called her once more to the task of Superior. This time, the tribulations came from the outside. The Revolution of 1848 had broken out. When they saw the signs of it, the Redemptoristines of Vienna omitted nothing to divert the anger of God. Continual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, prayers to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, penances – nothing was left undone, but the chalice of tribulation had been prepared and it had to be drunk.

Mother Marie-Celestine did it with an intrepid heart. On 6th April 1848, the insurgents assailed the Redemptorist convent in the morning. In the evening, at five o’clock, they attacked that of the Sisters, who scarcely had the time to flee through a breach in the garden wall. More than the others, the Superior was the object of pursuit by the rebels. She had to separate herself from her daughters and, with a broken heart, wander from one house to another belonging to the relatives and friends of the Sisters. And what did she not suffer then, seeing her daughters dispersed, denuded of everything, with no hope of being reunited again! Finally she found refuge with Baron Lago, the relative of one of her Sisters, and she remained in hiding in their house for the space of six weeks. She did everything she could to at least keep the property of the convent and the church, but it was all in vain. She even had to leave Vienna again in all haste with the family that had sheltered her. Soon afterwards, the suppression of the Order was decreed, and there was nothing else the poor Mother could do than rejoin some of her daughters who had found refuge with the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth at Aix-la-Chapelle, and who ardently desired her to come to them.

However, our divine Redeemer wished to draw good out of evil. The tempest which seemed to have destroyed everything determined the foundation of a new monastery in a country which had not possessed one before, and the convent of Vienna was soon able to be re-established. From Aix-la-Chapelle, the Sisters directed their steps to Holland, the hospitable land where since 1835 the Redemptorist Fathers had possessed at Wittem a former Capuchin convent founded in 1732, the same year that Saint Alphonsus had instituted the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer. In the village of Galoppe, not far from Wittem, a provisional monastery was being prepared for the Sisters, and Mother Marie-Celestine and her daughters made their entry there on 14th October of this same year of 1848. The enclosure was established. The next day, on the feast of Saint Teresa, the Sisters once more put on the habit of the Order, and everyone, after the first Mass celebrated in this sacred asylum, renewed their religious vows. The joy and gratitude of the Mother and her daughters was great and reached its peak when, after three years of waiting, the community was able to make its entry into the new Monastery of Marienthal, built in the village of Wittem, not far from the convent of the Redemptorist Fathers.

* * * * *

And now Mother Marie-Celestine had been chosen by God as the foundress of this new Monastery which was to give birth to many others, in particular the first Redemptoristine foundation across the Ocean. And she was to govern this house which until our own days has remained a model of regular observance, sanctity and apostolic spirit.

She fulfilled her mission with a zeal worthy of a true spouse of Jesus Christ, worthy of a privileged soul and endowed from her earliest years with very special graces. The Ven. Father Passerat, who visited her sometimes in her new abode, and the Superiors of the Convent of Wittem judged it necessary for her to continue exercising the functions of Superior, although her triennium had expired. The necessary dispensations were easily obtained. Under her government, the Monastery soon began to prosper. Her activity successfully faced all the difficulties in the beginning and soon the vocations came forward. The Order of the Redemptoristines having been re-established in Austria (1853), Mother Marie-Celestine generously made the sacrifice of two of her daughters, Mothers Marie-Victoria and Marie-Aloysia, the one being elected as the Superior of Ried and the other of Vienna. But God compensated her amply, so much so that, six years after her entry into Marienthal, the buildings were found to be insufficient to cope with the number of vocations, and they had to be extended.

Re-elected Superior in 1857, the good Mother then had a thought most worthy of her great heart. As a true daughter of the Church, she wished to console the heart of Pius IX by giving him news of the Monastery and asking for his holy blessing. Her letter was accompanied by several pictures painted by the nuns. Here is the text:

Most Holy Father,
“Sister Marie-Celestine of the Five Wounds of Jesus Christ, Superior of the Religious of the Most Holy Redeemer in the Convent of Marienthal, Diocese of Roermond, in Holland, - most humbly prostrated at the feet of Your Holiness, takes, in the name of her community, the respectful liberty of expressing to the Holy See and to the most worthy successor of Saint Peter the sentiments of profound veneration and entire devotion by which the spiritual daughters of Saint Alphonsus de Liguori are animated in regard to the common Father of the faithful.

“We always remember with a sweet consolation, Most Holy Father, the great part that Your Holiness played in the destiny of the Daughters of Saint Alphonsus at the time of trials in 1848, when they were victims of the revolution in the capital of Austria. Chased from Vienna, they took refuge in a solitary place in the Dutch province of Limburg, where, first of all renting a little house, they lived together in community, observing as far as was possible the Rules of their holy Institute. After surmounting many obstacles, we had the happiness of constructing a regular monastery with a little chapel. But what gave us the greatest happiness was that Your Holiness deigned, by a quite extraordinary favour, to bless our enterprise and grant our new foundation canonical approval, dated from 30th January 1852.”

Since this time, the Lord has filled us with graces, as although we are living in a Protestant kingdom, we nonetheless enjoy a happy liberty which has given us every facility for observing our holy Rules to the letter. Moreover, the Lord has favoured us with numerous and good vocations. Many persons from the best families in society have asked for and obtained their admission into our new monastery, delivering themselves now heart and soul to the contemplative life, the principal aim of our Order. We are already twenty five religious, and our monastery is no longer sufficient for so many requests for admission, and we see ourselves obliged to think of increasing the present buildings of our convent considerably, with the consent of our Most Reverend Bishop.

“So now we come before you very humbly to ask for Your Holiness’ blessing upon our new enterprise and especially upon the community of Religious Redemptoristines of Marienthal. So give us a place in Your paternal heart, Most Holy Father, and keep us always under Your beneficent protection. Thus united in heart and spirit to the visible Head of our Mother the Holy Church, we shall be able entreat the Father of mercies with greater confidence to fill Your Holiness with the consolations and graces necessary for the government of the Church. And in truth, we are already obliged by our holy Rules to offer up our prayers daily for the needs of the Church; but the numerous proofs of paternal charity that Your Holiness has given us up till this moment, leads us and obliges us in a particular manner to say special prayers for the happiness and preservation of Your sacred person.

“And so, Most Holy Father, please accept the sentiments of gratitude, respect and devotion that Your spiritual daughters of Marienthal offer You. Humbly prostrated at the feet of Your Holiness, I dare once again to reiterate my respectful request for You to give me Your holy blessing, and to also especially bless each one of my spiritual daughters.
“With the most profound respect,
“Your Holiness’ most humble and obedient servant.
“Sister MARIE-CELESTINE of the five sacred wounds of Jesus Christ.”
Marienthal, 21st March 1858.

This letter was to go straight to the paternal heart of Pius IX. The holy Pontiff deigned to send the following reply on 14th July of the same year. We translate it from the Latin.

PIUS IX, Pope.
To our dear Daughter Marie-Celestine of the five sacred Wounds of Jesus Christ.
“Dear Daughter in Jesus Christ, greetings and apostolic blessing.
Your letter of 21st March last has reached us. It is a new and dazzling witness of your filial devotion towards us, your faith, your piety and your obedience. It has mitigated the sorrow that we experienced long ago when we learnt that in the very grave political troubles, turbulent and seditious men chased you away from your house in Vienna and sent you into exile. It has been a great consolation for us to learn from your letter that in the midst of these troubles and tempests you have been able to find a safe and tranquil asylum in Holland where you can attend in peace to the duties of your holy state, and where your religious Institute has recruited numerous vocations. Blessed be God, the Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, whose Providence has thus determined many people to let themselves be guided by the example of your virtues and embrace religious life!

“You must thus recognize all the blessings of the divine clemency with the greatest zeal and walk with the greatest eagerness in the way of perfection. Apply yourselves with all your powers, my dear daughters in Jesus Christ, to practise these virtues which have cast the greatest lustre on this brilliant model of sanctity, Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, your Father. Never once cease to honour and serve, with an entirely filial zeal and piety, the most holy Mother of God conceived without original stain, through whom God willed all graces should come to us continually. Remember also every day in your prayers our own feebleness, so that our actions and efforts may contribute to the greatest glory of the name of God and the good of all the faithful.

“As a measure of Our paternal charity, for you and your companions, and as a harbinger of heavenly grace, We give you with Our love, to both you, dear Daughter in Jesus Christ and to all your Sisters, Our apostolic blessing.

“Given at Rome, the seat of Saint Peter, on 14th July 1858 in the thirteenth year of our Pontificate.
“PIUS IX, Pope.”

This letter from the Vicar of Jesus Christ was a great consolation for the faith and apostolic zeal of Mother Marie-Celestine and encouraged her singularly in the exercise of her charge. And indeed she was re-elected Superior in 1863 and 1871, in spite of her sickly state. This languor began in 1859, at the time of the first death that took place in the new monastery. A remarkable circumstance marked this first departure for heaven. In 1849, and at the beginning of the foundation, Mother Marie-Celestine had instantly asked the Lord not to let any Sister die before ten years had elapsed, and this was to let the community be established solidly. She was heard to the letter, but at the same time she received, until her death, the prerogative of bodily sufferings which often confined her to a bed of sorrows. The death of her long-time companions and the departure of two other Sisters for the Convent of Vienna which was then suffering, were all new crosses for her heart. These crosses, it is true, found some compensation in the joy of a new foundation established at Sambeek in Dutch Brabant in 1874. Thirteen Sisters were sent there. Mother Marie-Celestine succeeded in the same year in dissuading her daughters from their plan to re-elect her, and she even begged the Bishop of Roermond not to grant the dispensation required. She was named Mother Vicar, and while she was exercising this charge, she suffered the terrible trial of the year 1877, when the Convent of Marienthal became the prey of flames. The poor Mother, suffering and confined to bed, was brought by the Countess of Ansembourg to her mansion at Galoppe. When she felt a bit better, she joined her Sisters who had found refuge near Maastricht, and re-entered Marienthal with them in the month of October 1877.

From this time on her life was simply a long succession of sufferings. According to the doctor, her last long illness was accompanied by sorrows such that the doctor had never seen greater. To these exterior pains was added an interior abandonment which afflicted her to a supreme degree. Since she was thirty she had never tasted consolations, but this time, it was rather a moral agony to which no one could supply a remedy. And yet, in the depths of this resolute soul, the Lord imbued a powerful grace that sustained her without her realising it and helped her prepare herself for her eternal wedding. This sorrowful preparation, according to God’s plan, was to replace the religious help which ordinarily was not lacking in the monasteries. The death of Mother Marie-Celestine was most unusual. On 12th December 1878, the community was reciting the Office of the Dead for a Sister who had died at Sambeek. Suddenly some noises could be heard coming from the Infirmary. They ran there in all haste and found the dead body of Mother Marie-Celestine sitting in her chair, dressed in the habit of the Redemptoristines. She had reached the age of seventy, and she had spent nearly fifty of them in the Order of the Most Holy Redeemer.

A wise and strong woman, a great and generous soul, with a tender and solid devotion, endowed with a sure and practical common sense, full of faith and a very active love, she was, for nearly half a century, the pillar and strength of the Order of the Redemptoristines beyond the Alps. As a Superior, she united a very maternal goodness and tenderness with a wise rigour for the observance of the Rules, always avoiding the extremes. She had a special talent for consoling the afflicted and souls who were tempted. In her general conduct there was nothing arrogant, nothing hard or harsh. Cheerful and gentle in conversation, she made the best impression on strangers.”

The source of her great strength of soul and the immense services she rendered the Order was her profound humility, her love of obedience and the hidden life, and especially her love of prayer. The Venerable Father Passerat once called her a soul of prayer. And it was especially before the Blessed Sacrament that she opened up her soul, and found strength and light for herself and for the matters that she was responsible for. She truly merited the title of Bride of the Blessed Sacrament. Her soul is depicted marvellously in Farewell to the Blessed Sacrament that she loved to recite: “Farewell, my Jesus, farewell, my Spouse, remember Your bride in Your mercy. I recommend to the holy Wound in Your side, all my interests, those that are mine and those of this community and the entire Order. Through Your holy wounds and Your blood, be propitious and merciful to us, O my Jesus. Through Your blessing that I ask of You and without which I shall not leave You, ensure that I live uniquely for You in love and reverence. While I am waiting, I leave my heart before Your tabernacle like a burning lamp, with the most lively desire that every time it beats it will praise and glorify You in my place during my absence, in the sentiments that inspire Your adorable Heart in this sacrament of love.” Mother Marie-Celestine also had a very special devotion for the Mother of Sorrows, and she took her as Patron for the chapel in Marienthal. She propagated her cult in the new Monastery. She counselled her Sisters to have recourse continually to this tender Mother in all their needs and in all the difficulties and contradictions that they would have to suffer. “One Ave Maria on these occasions,” she would say, “is worth more that all your words and all your complaints. I have often had this experience.”

One day, a novice who was strongly tempted to abandon her vocation went to tell her of all her pain and ask her for permission to leave. The good Mother replied to her that it was the will of God for her to remain in the monastery. She encouraged her and made the sign of the cross on her forehead, saying: “Jesus crucified be in all my thoughts! Jesus crucified be in all my words! Jesus crucified be in my heart!” The temptation disappeared immediately and the novice persevered.

May these words, which are like the motto of a Redemptoristine, be confirmed in all the daughters of St. Alphonse who recognize a model and mediatrix in Mother Marie-Celestine. May this worthy Bride of Jesus Christ, through the effect of her words, live especially in the hearts of all the Redemptoristines of Marienthal, for was she not their Foundress, was she not their Mother, through her love, her actions and especially through her sufferings?

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Monastery of Marienthal

* * MONASTERY OF MARIENTHAL * *

History of the Foundation of the Monastery

The Revolution of 1848 drove Redemptorists and Redemptoristines from Vienna, these last were then governed by Mother Marie-Célestine.

All hope of recovering the Monastery having disappeared, they thought it a good idea to evacuate the foreign Sisters first of all from Vienna, and send them back home to their own country. These Sisters were seven in number, and some of them originally came from the Rhineland and the others from Holland. They had to go back to their countries of birth dressed in the clothes of the poor, bringing with them only the most necessary things. On 16th April 1848, they arrived at Aix-la-Chapelle. The following day, a relative of one of them came to meet her and bring her to the Redemptoristines of Bruges, where she had asked for admission. The six other Sisters refused point blank to be separated: they waited at Aix-la-Chapelle for the arrival of the Very Rev. Father Heilig, then the Provincial of the Belgian Province. They desired to place themselves under the direction of this excellent religious.

As soon as he arrived, the Very Rev. Father Heilig showed the refugees a lively compassion and took a truly paternal care of them. He also worked hard to find them a suitable habitation. Thanks to his intervention, the good Sisters of Saint Elizabeth in Aix-la-Chapelle offered them asylum in their convent. The offer was joyfully accepted and the poor exiles were thus able to find retreat in the cloister and the good things that it offered: the affection and tender charity of the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth added another prize.

The Very Rev. Father Provincial equally recommended the little community to the good care of the Very Rev. Father Koeman, Rector of the Redemptorists of Wittem. He also rendered his best services to the Sisters. Although they were confessed every week by the confessor of the convent that was sheltering them, they went every month to be confessed by the Rev. Father Rector at Wittem, and receive his direction. From time to time, Father Koeman would go to Aix-la-Chapelle, or rather, he would send a Father from his community there to give them a spiritual conference. The Venerable Father Passerat visited them twice, and this was a great consolation to them. On 8th June, Mother Marie-Célestine arrived, accompanied by Sister Marie-Victoria. The joy at seeing each other again was great, and the good Sisters of Saint Elizabeth, sharing in the common joy, gave the newly arrived their own cells. In the month of September Sister Marie-Madeleine finally arrived with two other converse Sisters: all of them were welcomed with great goodness and housed for fifteen days.

* * * * *

However, they had to think of leaving the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth, whose devotion and charity had been above every eulogy. After many enquiries, the Rev. Father Rector of the Redemptorists of Wittem found at Galoppe (Dutch Limburg), at half a league from Wittem, a suitable house. The Reverend Mother Superior took it on rent, and it was leased from the beginning of October.

The farewells to the good Sisters of Saint Elizabeth were very touching: no one could forget, or will ever forget how much they consoled the sorrows of exile. The Redemptoristines left their charitable house and entered that of Galoppe on 14th October. Rev. Father Koeman celebrated Mass there the next day and left the Blessed Sacrament and also blessed the house.

The joy of possessing a convent was great; the consolation of finding themselves under the direction of the Fathers of the Congregation was no less. The Sisters remained in this house until 26th June 1851. A short time afterwards, the Very Rev. Father Heilig, the Provincial, arrived. He told the community that he had consulted the superior authorities and the Rev. Father Rector of Wittem: they had decided to purchase the sisters a new convent, this time a definitive one. “No difficulty,” he added, “could arise here about the purchase of a new house, because in this country we enjoy a great religious liberty.”

However, there would be one condition for entry into this Monastery, and each Sister had to accept the following conditions in writing: “The convent of Vienna, if ever it can be re-established, the Sister undertakes to never return there, but to remain in this new foundation. She would also use in favour of this new Monastery whatever remains of her fortune.” This done, the Very Rev. Father Heilig came with Rev. Father Smetana, the Vicar General of the Congregation beyond the Alps, to examine all the details relative to the construction of the convent. The land was bought in a little place called Partij, near Wittem. The Monastery was to be built in conformity with all the prescriptions of the Rule; and also in conformity with religious poverty.

It was on 5th October 1849 that the first stone of the new convent was laid. The honour went to the Very Rev. Father Heilig, the Provincial; the Rev. Father Rector laid the second. At the beginning, the building offered great difficulties as the soil constantly subsided. It became impossible to lay bricks and they had to be supported by beams. The architect saw no danger at all; but the construction required a great deal of time and could only advance slowly.

If the joy of the Sisters had been great when they entered their rented house at Galoppe, it was even more so when they entered Marienthal (Valley of Mary) as this was the name that the Very Rev. Father Provincial gave the convent, to the great contentment of the Sisters. So as to avoid attracting the general attention, they made their entry in the most complete silence on 26th June 1851. The chapel was consecrated to Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows. It was blessed as was the entire convent, in the name of Mons the Bishop of Roermond, by Rev. Father Koeman. The day after this ceremony, the Rev. Father Rector celebrated the first Mass, and from then on the Redeemer established Himself in the new house to be its source of graces.

* * * * *

The convent of Marienthal was now finally established: the Revolution, in rudely shaking the tree of the Institute of the Redemptoristines, had succeeded only in scattering its seeds afar, and Satan’s plans had been foiled once again by divine Providence.

A short while afterwards, religion recovered a greater liberty in Austria, under the reign of the young and pious Emperor Franz Joseph. On 23rd June 1852, the Sovereign signed a decree permitting the Redemptorists and Redemptoristines to re-enter the country, and the convent in Vienna was re-opened. At the same time a new foundation was also opened at Ried, in Lower Austria. The Sisters who were destined for this Monastery left the solitary cloister of Marienthal, which was so dear to them. They did not in the least doubt that great trials would crown their sacrifice. On 24th November they received the news of the death of Sister Marie-Xaviera and the great danger of death facing the Mother Superior. Then there was an epidemic of smallpox that ravaged the country and attacked the nuns. The Superior, Mother Marie-Madeleine, only recovered after long sufferings, but she did recover; may Our Lord be praised for it! Without her, this foundation would have suffered a great loss, and the return to Vienna could not have been made. Sister Marie-Madeleine had to leave the convent of Ried in 1853 in order to re-establish the convent of Vienna, and she was accompanied by two Sisters from Marienthal. Sister Marie-Victoria was then appointed to lead the Monastery of Ried.

However, the convent of Marienthal prospered more and more, and before the Kulturkampf burst onto the scene, there were plans to found a house in the Rhineland provinces. A large property was bought in the area of Koblenz-Vallenduri; and the Sisters had already been designated for this foundation, when the tempest of persecution broke out in fury against all the Catholic institutions of the German Empire. Later on, the house was sold at a loss, as there was no longer any hope of re-establishing it. In its place, the convent of Sambeek was founded near Boxmeer, in the north of Dutch Brabant. All the Sisters who were sent there, number 10 in all, were Dutch, except for the Superior. This house prospered rapidly and was visibly blessed from on high.

* * * * * * * * * *

In 1877, the convent of Marienthal was, in its turn, visited by a trial: a fire broke out and it destroyed it from top to bottom. This was on 25th January, the day when the Order pays very special honour to the holy Child Jesus. The beautiful Christmas crib was still exposed, and the novices had just offered up their last prayers to the divine Saviour there. Suddenly a cloud of smoke rose up from the Crib. A novice saw it and let out a cry, but it was too late! A piece of paper had caught fire from one of the candles surrounding the artificial rocks, and the flames soared up. A wooden wall which touched the crib and went up to the attic now caught fire in its turn. Soon the whole building was captured by the flames, in spite of incredible efforts by the Redemptorist Students and the people from nearby who came running at the sound of the alarm. This was right in the middle of the night. The fire pumps failed and everyone had to resign themselves to seeing their beautiful Monastery burn down. All that was left were the exterior walls. However, many objects were snatched from the flames, thanks to the devotion of the Students and at least there was no loss of life. The roof of the chapel was entirely consumed, but they were able to save the Blessed Sacrament and the most precious objects.

The same evening, the Rev. Father Rector of Wittem, later Mons. Wulfingh [1] left for the Franciscan Sisters at Nonnenwerth. They had rented an old mansion at Maastricht so they would have somewhere to go if they were persecuted. They immediately deferred to the Rev. Father Rector’s wishes and offered their hospitality to the Sisters of Marienthal. It was in this house, called “the Great Swiss House” that the community lived until the month of October of the same year. At this time, part of the new convent of Marienthal was built and finished.

“The good Fathers of Wittem offered us the greatest charity in these sorrowful circumstances. During the first week of our emigration, the Students and a converse Brother worked actively to put our house in order. From the spiritual point of view, we were very privileged. Three Fathers came in turn to the “Great Swiss House” and preached conferences for us every week. We also had the great happiness of possessing the Blessed Sacrament in this place of exile.

“When the tragedy became known, we received so many marks of sympathy and different kinds of gifts that it would take too long here to mention the names of our benefactors and the nature of their gifts. But the consolation and joy which came to us from our Holy Father, Pope Pius IX, is something we cannot fail to mention. When the Holy Pontiff heard the news about the fire, he asked for more information through the Nuncio in Holland, Mons. Capri. After he received the information he wanted from the Rev. Father Rector of Wittem, the Nuncio sent the sum of 3000 francs for the Redemptoristines of Marienthal. This generous gift, offered by the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth, filled every heart with joy. We immediately sent the Holy Father, and also the Nuncio, the expression of our profound gratitude.

“Thanks to the speed with which the work of reconstruction was conducted, after three months of exile we were able to leave the “Great Swiss House” and return to our own Monastery. On 10th October the last Sisters arrived. Every time a carriage stopped in front of the convent, the three bells filled the air with their joyous song. Each time too, our hearts beat in unison. Gradually, as everything was repaired, we reverted to the customs of the former Monastery. The following year, we lost the last Choir Sisters who had suffered expulsion from Vienna, Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph and Mother Marie-Celestine. They died ten days apart.”

Some years later, the convent of Marienthal, which was now more flourishing than ever, was to introduce the Redemptoristines into America, and for the first time the Daughters of Saint Alphonsus brought the New World the help of their prayers and sacrifices. [2]

Footnotes

[1] Mons. Wulfingh died at sea in 1906 while returning to Surinam.
[2] The story of this foundation in Canada will be told later on.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph, O.SS.R. of the Monastery of Vienna (1828 - 1893)

How Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph pruned the vine and what resulted from it.

Elisabeth Kretzl was born at Bomilskrut, in Lower Austria, on 4th November 1828. Her parents were poor, but very pious. While she was still young she lost her father and a short time afterwards, her poor mother’s house was destroyed by fire, which was a great trial for the whole family. Elisabeth, the youngest of five children, then said to her mother: “Dear mother, I am going to Vienna to earn something, and I will send you what I can.”

After Elisabeth had served some time in Vienna, Jesus deigned to cast a glance upon her. One day when she was visiting the churches in this capital, she went with her companions into Saint Mary of the Riverbank, the church of the Redemptorist Fathers. The door to the sacristy was open. Elisabeth stopped there for a moment and looked at the priests who were reclothing the sacred ornaments. But at this very moment, the venerable Father Passerat, kneeling on a prayer-stool, with his head in his hands, was praying ardently. Through his fingers he noticed Elisabeth and cried out to her: “Eh, young lady, come here!” She did not understand him very well, and looked at the Father with great embarrassment. Her companions said to her in their peasant language: “He’s calling you. Go and talk to him.” She went up to him and the Father asked her: “Do you know how to prune vines?” When she replied in the affirmative, Father Passerat told her: “Go to the religious of Renweg and tell them that Father Passerat has said: “Take her, you can make something of her.” So she went there, without thinking that she was going to a convent. When she arrived in the Redemptoristines’ parlour, she repeated what Father Passerat had told her. At the words “you can make something of her” the Sisters started laughing. So they accepted the young lady on trial as a postulant door-keeper, and soon she rendered some very great services to the community.

These things happened in the year 1847. The following year, on 6th April, the Revolution broke out, and savage bands of revolutionaries broke into the convent. The religious had to flee in all haste to save their lives. It was in these days especially that Elisabeth showed her admirable devotion. Mr. Ignace Duxmer, one of the most devout servants of the community, was charged with remaining in the monastery, safeguarding what remained and preventing new misfortunes. On the first day he and Elisabeth could only weep and groan, because the scoundrels had smashed everything with their sabres, even the most beautiful pictures. Thanks be to God, on the next day, with the aid of some devout persons, they managed to save many objects, but this was not without courting great dangers.

However, the Sisters had founded the Convent of Ried, and Father Breslmeier was the community confessor. Mr. Duxmer told this venerable priest how faithful and devout Elisabeth had shown herself, and persuaded him that she would be an excellent door-keeper. So he called her, and as soon as she was able to leave service in Vienna, she came to the convent. This was in the month of October 1852. The smallpox epidemic that was raging then allowed her to make use of the knowledge she had acquired in a hospital in the service of the sick, and she took care of the sisters with the greatest devotion. In order to reward her, on 9th June 1853 she was received as a postulant converse. On 5th July 1855 she was given the religious habit, with the white veil and the name of Sister Anne of the Immaculate Conception. Elisabeth’s joy was immense.

* * * *

“You can make something of her.” Father Passerat’s words did not pass out of the good Sister’s memory, but she thought of them only in order to generously fulfil her duties as a converse Sister. Others thought of them too, but for another purpose. This Sister, who was so capable, so devout, and who had already rendered the Congregation some important services, also had a very beautiful voice. One very respected Sister, Sister Marie-Michelle, as she lay dying expressed the desire for Sister Anne to be elevated to the rank of Choir Sister. They agreed, and on 13th May 1857, the good Elisabeth made her profession.

Why was her name changed to Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph? It was no doubt because of her great devotion to the holy Patriarch. As soon as they began telling her about Saint Joseph, she became filled with enthusiasm, her eyes shining with happiness, and she never stopped in the praises she addressed to her great Patron. “I am convinced,” she said one day, “that Saint Joseph is in heaven in body and soul, because, on earth, he bore the Son of God in his arms, and He gave him the name of Father.” The books that spoke of Saint Joseph were her favourite books. Every day she honoured this great Saint and prepared herself for his feasts with a fervent novena, and in order to celebrate the 19th March properly, she disposed herself by the pious practice of the seven Wednesdays, so well explained by Saint Alphonsus. In brief, in all her difficulties, she would have recourse to Saint Joseph and advised others to do the same.

After her profession, says the convent chronicle, Sister Marie-Anne- Joseph felt herself at the peak of her happiness, as she had obtained what she had desired so much, and her heart overflowed with gratitude towards God and the monastery too. She successively fulfilled different tasks with great zeal. She sang and chanted psalms in choir with the greatest joy and showed herself no less ardent for meditation on holy things. It so happened one day that the venerable Father Breslmeier was struck down by a grave illness, and soon his life was in danger. When Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph learnt of it, she set herself to prayer with all the fervour of her soul: “My God,” she said, “preserve this holy priest for us, who has already done the convent so much good, and who is still working so much for Your glory. Are we then so rich in good priests? Oh, take me, my God, me, a poor useless religious, take me in place of this holy man.”

God accepted His servant’s offer. Father Breslmeier recovered and was able to go back to fulfilling all his functions, but Sister Marie-Anne-Joseph fell gravely ill. She said: “The good God has deigned to accept my sacrifice, and, in His infinite mercy, He has made me expiate my sins in this world.” The entire year that she had to spend in the infirmary was in fact like a year in Purgatory. In her last month especially, her sufferings became intolerable. She who had been so good and so devoted to the sick, now became incapable of making any movement. She became completely hydropic, having a horribly swollen and apparently gangrenous foot, and she was reduced, in her last days, to wringing her hands with pain, in the embrace of this terrible illness. In spite of everything, her patience did not abandon her. The prayers, especially the indulgenced prayers, to which she was accustomed to saying throughout her life, again found a place on her lips at the approach of death. As necessary, she asked her attendant to help her in this sweet business with God. Finally, on 6th August 1893, surrounded by all her Sisters in religion, fortified by the last sacraments and the exhortations of the holy Father Breslmeier, Sister Anne-Marie-Joseph rendered her soul to God with a smile.

The heavenly Vigneron had also pruned His vine.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Mother Marie-Aloysia of the Blessed Sacrament, O.SS.R. of the Monastery of Vienna (1822 - 1889)

Born Eleonore Donat

Mother Marie-Aloysia was born on 4th September 1822 at Georgswald in Bohemia of parents favoured by property and fortune, but esteemed especially because of their virtues. Her father had so lively a faith that one day he was cured miraculously of a dangerous illness by the single invocation of the name of Jesus.

Young Eleonore had a very lively and outgoing spirit, which attracted many reprimands to her from the part of her mother, whose character was rather inclined to severity. After two years in boarding school spent with the Cistercian Sisters of Marienstern in Saxony, she lived piously in the paternal home, until the marriage of her sister caused her attention to become fixed upon the choice of a state of life. She prayed a great deal to the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin, and spent long hours in the chapel of the Capuchins of Rumburg. Finally, after about eighteen days of prayer and reflection, she woke up one morning quite decided to preserve her virginity. “I dreamed during the night,” she said, “that I entered our parish church to ask for God’s light there. But then on the threshold I saw two great open letters. One of them had written in beautiful characters: “Do not marry!” and on the other: “But rather become an anchorite.” So I do not wish to have an earthly husband,” she added.

Soon afterwards she decided for the religious life, but in a convent where the primitive Rule was still in vigour. This resolution was strengthened by reading the beautiful work of St. Alphonsus called “The true Spouse of Jesus Christ.” Then once more on the occasion of the marriage of another of her sisters, for the first time in her life she heard mention of the name of the “Redemptoristine Sisters,” in reference to an incident that a newspaper in Vienna reported about them. “There is where I must go,” she said resolutely, and soon she had more complete information about the Order that finally decided her vocation. Her father accompanied her to Vienna and put her into the hands of the Superior, saying: “I am bringing you my child, who has never caused me any pain.” This was on 10th October 1846. Eleonore’s extreme love for her father was the great temptation for her at the beginning of her religious life. She emerged victorious from it and received the habit on 16th November 1847, with the name of Sister Marie-Aloysia of the Blessed Sacrament. On the same day, the Venerable Father Joseph Passerat, the Vicar-General of the Redemptorists, came to visit the convent and when he saw Sister Marie-Aloysia, he said: “She who is now the last will one day be the first in the community.” It was prophetic.

* * * *

Five months of her novitiate passed under the wise conduct of Mother Marie-Victoria, born the Countess of Welsersheimb, one of the first Redemptoristines beyond the Alps. In the month of April 1848, the Revolution broke out and obliged the Sisters to abandon their holy retreat at night. It was in this grave conjuncture that the novice, Marie-Aloysia gave proof of her solid virtue. Disguised in secular clothes, she first of all found refuge with the sister of her Mistress Marie-Victoria, Madam the Baroness of Lago. Fear of being discovered, made more real by the continual pursuits carried out against “the Liguorians” was the reason why she went to stay with a friend of her father, until he brought her to her paternal home. Amongst all these vicissitudes, Sister Marie-Aloysia, in spite of her profound sadness, maintained an admirable calmness and meekness. In the domestic home, she put the Redemptoristine habit back on and continued her life as a novice in the best way possible, without refusing to do manual jobs around the house. She then devoted herself especially to the illness of her youngest sister Marie, who died at the age of fifteen. For eighteen weeks she lavished upon her night and day the care that her state required.

In order to receive Holy Communion more often, she did not hesitate to often make a long journey, in the early morning, through the snow and darkness, and went to the Capuchin church in Rumburg, where they were less miserly than elsewhere in the distribution of this sacred bread. However, she longed for her little cell “which was,” she said, “so near to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.” Her wishes were finally heard. Following the circumstances already known to the reader, the Redemptoristine Monastery of Marienthal had just been inaugurated on 26th June 1851, on the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. As soon as she learnt of this happy event, Sister Marie-Aloysia hastened to tear herself away from the love of her relatives and went there, brought once more by her father, and took refuge in the new asylum. On 22nd April 1852, she was united forever to her divine Redeemer by the vows of religion.

So we can see how her trial only succeeded in increasing her fervour. Her love for observance and the interior life, and her devotion to the sacred mysteries, shone out with even greater brilliance, at the same time that her zeal for the Divine Office and her abilities at the different tasks in the monastery. For many years she was Mistress of Educandes and then Mistress of Novices. In the exercise of these two charges, she demonstrated a truly maternal goodness to her daughters, but yet using a holy rigour in forming them in solid virtues and the observance of the Rules. She instructed them besides more by her examples than her words, and thus was able to gain the affection and confidence of them all. “She was an accomplished religious” said a contemporary. In 1868 she was chosen to replace the Reverend Mother Marie-Gabrielle in the charge of Superior. And it was then that she had a little chapel erected in honour of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour, whose cult was beginning to be propagated. She also renovated the mortuary chapel of the convent. When her triennium had expired she was elected Vicar and distinguished herself then as much by her love for the hidden life as she had done by her great qualities of zealous Superior.

* * * * *

Who would have thought that Mother Marie-Aloysia had once again to leave her dear convent? However, this happened in 1871. The Convent of Vienna had just lost its Superior, Mother Marie-Madeleine, who as she lay dying, advised asking for the Mother Vicar of Marienthal to succeed her. After long hesitations, Marienthal finally decided to make the sacrifice demanded of them. Mother Marie-Aloysia submitted herself humbly to the will of God. Accompanied by the Very Rev. Father Heilig, the Superior of the German Redemptorists, she left for Cologne. Her spirit of recollection and sacrifice made her renounce seeing the magnificent cathedral in this city and the beautiful countryside along the Rhine. In Vienna, she was received with a jubilation that contrasted singularly with the painful trials that were about to be her lot.

In fact, the Monastery was in such a deplorable state in matters material and financial that they feared they would have to abandon it. Soon the good Mother was seized by a throat infection so painful that it made her unfit for service in the choir, already depleted by the small number of her subjects and the bad health of others. She recovered from this illness after ten months, through the intercession of Saint Joseph, to whom she vowed a special cult. To remedy the lack of vocations, she solemnly consecrated the community, and particularly the educandate, to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Heaven’s first response was a new illness that nailed the Superior onto a bed of sorrows for the space of fifteen months, while three other Sisters also fell very dangerously ill.

In these terrible trials, the Superior showed a profound humility, a perfect resignation to the will of God, and a confidence truly magnanimous in His mercy. In spite of obstacles that appeared to be insurmountable, they maintained the service of the choir as well as they could. This faithfulness was rewarded in a touching manner. All the Sisters attested that on Sundays especially and on feast days, an unknown voice resonated with theirs in the chant for Terce and Vespers, and the miracle lasted until the number of religious was increased. This was like a signal of deliverance. The worthy Superior and her courageous daughters sought their support in prayer. They held processions and introduced a Holy Hour in honour of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. These prayers were heard. Mother recovered against all hope, vocations multiplied, and benefactors opened their hearts and hands to meet the needs of the Monastery.

Mother Marie-Aloysia held the position of Superior from 1871 to 1877. Then, after three years as Vicar, she was re-elected Superior and remained so until her blessed death, which arrived in 1889. It was her religious virtues, whose example she gave constantly, that caused her to be so long the head of her Sisters. They admired her love of poverty, and that spirit of perfect obedience which made her say one day to a religious: “My Sister, we must not permit ourselves even thoughts contrary to those of the Superior, as these thoughts will make us lose the merit of obedience.”

Her recollection was continuous, and she practised it everywhere, even in the garden, where the modesty of her eyes was admirable. So she was so filled with the spirit of God that a special grace accompanied her words. One day, a visiting priest had her called to the parlour and asked her for a word of consolation and encouragement. Mother Marie-Aloysia was astonished and replied timidly: “My Reverend Father, God is so good! Yes, He is extremely good!” The priest replied: “This is enough for me, my Reverend Mother”, and he left completely consoled.

As Superior, she always demonstrated a very maternal goodness and solicitude to her daughters. The sick especially were the object of her scrupulous attention. Even though she was ill herself and overloaded with occupations, she visited them often.

After the Immaculate Virgin and Saint Joseph, she especially honoured Saint Alphonsus. The spiritual works of the holy Doctor were her preferred books, and she frequently recommended reading them to her daughters. Finally, the souls in Purgatory found in her a tender and devoted friend.

Such were the principal features of the life and virtues of the good Mother Marie-Aloysia. During her last years, the heavenly Spouse announced His approach several times by illnesses and infirmities. On 8th September, on the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, she took Holy Communion in choir with her Sisters for the last time. Soon afterwards, she had to go to bed and receive the last sacraments. Finally, on the night of 20th September 1889, she went to sleep peacefully in the Lord, at the age of 67 and 16 days, in the 36th year of her religious profession.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Mother Marie-Madeleine of the Blessed Sacrament, O.SS.R. of the Monastery of Vienna (1805 – 1871)

In the world : Rosalie Handschky

Mother Marie-Madeleine of the Blessed Sacrament was born in Vienna in 1805, as the only child of very well-off parents. Losing her mother very early on, she received from her father, who loved her tenderly, an education in keeping with her rank and fortune. She learnt several languages, acquired an expert knowledge of the musical art, and enriched her spirit with a broad range of knowledge. As for manual work, it seems that she had little acquaintance with it. Her father could not bear her to be parted from him, and he took her with him to the Chancellor’s office, where he was a government lawyer, and sometimes gave her a part in his work. She accompanied him everywhere – to the theatre, on visits, on innumerable pleasure trips, and horse-riding, in which she showed a great deal of dexterity. This kind of life gave her a certain virility of character which served her marvellously.

Her piety, which at first was quite ordinary, soon grew through the visits she made, in the company of her governess, to the church of the Redemptorist Fathers. From then on she began to receive the sacraments more frequently, but without her father knowing. For her confessor she chose the Venerable Father Passerat. Under the direction of this great Servant of God, the desire for the religious life soon took hold of her heart. The visits she made to the Redemptoristines in the capital only served to inflame this desire, and she resolved to enter their Institute after the death of her father. This death happened in 1830, during an epidemic of cholera that claimed many victims in Vienna.

Now the young lady found herself suddenly free, and in possession of great wealth, at an age and in a position where everything smiled upon her. But with a greatness of soul which is most uncommon, she despised the money, made abundant donations, and after having put her affairs in order, she entered the Redemptoristine Convent on 5th May 1852, in spite of the great astonishment that her resolution caused to those around her, and the malicious insinuations that accompanied her. She took her contempt of the world so far that when her cook obtained her admission to the monastery at the same time as herself, but in the quality of a converse, she kneeled beside her at the door of the enclosure and resolutely asked to be admitted in the same capacity. They did not give way to these desires, and it was as a choir Sister that she was received into the Institute.

No one was astonished that the beginnings of her religious life were very painful for a young lady accustomed to all the comforts of life. They admired even more in her a courage that was more than manly, and truly heroic, in overcoming herself on every occasion. Moreover, she had expected all this. Firmly resolved to overcome herself, she took as her motto: “God alone.” Thus she succeeded in accommodating herself to all the ages and all the characters with which she had to deal. She never spoke of what she had seen in the world, and never wished to pass herself off as a person of substance above the ordinary.

* * * * *

On 21st January 1833, the novice received the habit with the name of Marie-Madeleine of the Blessed Sacrament. On 23rd January of the following year, she consecrated herself irrevocably to Jesus Christ. She spent five years in the practice of the religious virtues and in the humility of the hidden life, but in 1839 she was elected as the Superior. In this charge she displayed a great zeal for regular observance, and especially for the pious recitation of the Divine Office. What her conscience dictated to her she carried out without human respect, but at the same time she demonstrated a truly maternal goodness to all her Sisters. Re-elected after an interval of three years, she remained in charge until 1847, and had the sorrow of seeing her community violently dissolved by the Revolution of 1848. This trial did not diminish her courage. After spending some time with some of her companions at the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth in Aix-la-Chapelle, she went on to Holland, where other Redemptoristines had found a refuge close to the Redemptorist convent at Wittem. First of all she went to live in the provisional house called the “house of Jonas”, situated at Galoppe, and it was there that it was noticed for the first time that she played the piano with a remarkable ability. Then, when the convent of Marienthal was built, she entered it on 26th June 1851 with the other Sisters. But, from the month of October of the following year, she left it to go and govern the Monastery of Ried in Austria, which the young Emperor Franz-Joseph had just re-established.

A trial even harder than the others now awaited the courageous Superior. Hardly had she been installed than she was struck down by smallpox, which attacked her brain, and when the housekeeper, Sister Marie-Xaveria, succumbed under the onslaught of this illness, Mother Marie-Madeleine suddenly lost her spirit. In this terrible conjuncture, heaven was stormed with prayers. At Marienthal, a vow was made to recite the Memorare of the Sacred Heart of Jesus every day in choir. This divine Heart had pity on the poor invalid. She then recovered and had to leave for Vienna, where she was named Superior. This was in 1853.

This only served to change one cross with another, but the intrepid Mother truly sought just God alone. The Monastery of Vienna had by now been re-established. Nevertheless, poverty exercised its rigours with a bitterness hard to bear for the maternal heart of Mother Marie-Madeleine. Everything was lacking inside, and hearts outside seemed closed to pity. Although assisted by the Sisters of Marienthal, the community in Vienna carried its cross, and we may say very quickly that it carried it with courage, with their eyes fixed on their worthy Superior, whose greatness of soul and profound humility never appeared more clearly.

However, under the weight of so many trials, Mother Marie-Madeleine’s soul ripened for heaven. At the end of the year 1870, the good Mother was struck down by a pericardial hydropsy. Patience and continual prayer were all that she could oppose to this terrible illness. On 2nd January 1871, she expired without agony, surrounded by her desolate Sisters.

Her funeral was, we may say, the reward granted here below by Heaven to one who had had so little esteem for the favour of the world. It caused an extraordinary sensation. The crowd of people was incredible. The whole world wished to see “the Saint” as they called her, whose mortal remains shone with a superhuman beauty. The service was on the grand scale. The church was filled to bursting point and decorated as for one of the great days. All those in attendance, in the ranks of whom the numerous priests had pride of place, prayed with great fervour. This was how the divine Redeemer now honoured on earth the one who had left everything for love of Him, and who, through her renunciation and her sufferings, showed herself as the faithful imitator of His virtues.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Sister Marie-Cecile of the Precious Blood, O.SS.R. of the Monastery of Vienna (1821 – 1849)

Born Jeanne Koch

Sister Marie-Cecile of the Precious Blood was born at Innsbruck (Tyrol) on 24th June 1821, of parents of an ordinary station in life. Brought up piously by her mother, little Jeanne, from the moment of her first communion, felt herself so strongly attracted to the religious life that even then she made a vow of perpetual chastity. Her love of prayer was already extraordinary. At the age of twelve, she entered the Third Order of Saint Francis, and as her confessor recognized the signs of a vocation to the contemplative life in her, she learned to play the organ, so that she might be admitted one day into a monastery, in spite of lacking a sufficient dowry. But at just that very time, the Convent of the Redemptoristines in Vienna was looking for an educande who understood music. So Jeanne succeeded, with the help of her other qualities, in being admitted. She was then seventeen years of age.

Pious indeed though she may have been, she did not cease to severely test the patience of the Mother Mistress through the impetuosity and noisy vivacity of her character. But her good will, aided by the grace of God, triumphed over this defect, and ten months after her entry into the monastery, Jeanne was as though transformed! During her novitiate she was seen to make astonishing progress in virtue. Her love of prayer became a grace of high contemplation, and she received extraordinary favours from heaven. Her devotion to the Holy Child Jesus made her in her turn resemble an innocent child. Her candour and the purity of her soul were reflected in her features and in her eyes. Almost every year, the approach of Christmas saw her become completely ill, so much did she long for this touching feast! Her heart would beat violently, thinking of the coming of the Saviour of mankind, and she even went so far as to start spitting blood, so great was her emotion. But once the feast actually arrived she recovered her former health. She displayed the same ardour for the Blessed Sacrament of the altar. She was often seen remaining motionless for hours on end before the holy Tabernacle, and whenever she took Communion, she was transported so far out of herself that for several hours she was quite unable to take any food.

Sister Marie-Celeste’s virtues were the best guarantee of the heavenly origin of these favours. Her love of regular observance was admirable. Her humility made her give preference to performing the most distasteful tasks, in spite of the opposition of her character, which was by nature somewhat proud. Insatiable for mortification, she persuaded her confessor to intercede with her Superior to give her a little more liberty to appease her thirst for penance. She had been encouraged in it, she said, by Jesus Christ Himself. And yet her obedience was the greatest of her other virtues.

The novices had the custom, on 25th of the month, to write a letter to the Holy Child Jesus in which they expressed their desires. Sister Marie-Cecile continued this custom after her profession, but she would always give her letter to her Superior to read and approve. One day when she had just accomplished this act, she met a Sister who asked her why she had so joyful an air. She replied: “It is because I have just read out to my Superior my letter to the Holy Child Jesus, but next month, I will bring it to you.” And in fact, the following month, this Sister had become the Superior. In addition to this it was noted that Sister Marie-Cecile knew many things that she could not have known naturally, and she often even knew of the thoughts and dispositions of others.

* * * * *

Sister Marie-Cecile had received the holy habit on 20th August 1839. She had to wait until 20th August 1842 to make her profession, since the laws of Austria required this delay. And so the close union that she contracted with the divine Redeemer caused her to make new progress in perfection. For their part, her Superiors thought of making a more direct use of her talents. The Mistress of Novices asked her for spiritual exercises for the times of Advent and Lent. The young professed acquitted herself of this task with success. Charged with care of the educandes, she succeeded marvellously in forming them well. A Sister, greatly troubled in both her body and soul, was confided to her care, and she healed her in both respects. However, these different tasks and the macerations she inflicted on herself, adversely altered her health. She became so feeble that, to play the organ, she had need of a support to sustain her. She often lost sleep, but her infirmities in no way altered the vivacity of her spirit and the joy of her heart. If they pitied her over her insomnia, she would reply: “I was not alone.”

The Revolution of 1848 was the last and supreme trial for the poor Sister. Driven from her convent, she had to take refuge in a private house, and then painfully find her way to Innsbruck, her native town, and ask for shelter from her married sister who, poor herself, could not, in spite of her excellent heart, give her all the help necessary. Sister Marie-Cecile, ill, bed-ridden, consumptive, often subject to spitting up blood, also saw herself separated from her Superior and her Sisters in religion. But this pain, for her the most bitter one, was the triumph of her love for her divine Spouse. Her resignation was heroic, and the Sisters of Mercy in Innsbruck, who gave her shelter in their monastery, admired in her the patience and charity of a saint. She died only slowly, but the joy of soon contemplating Him whom she loved so much shone out on her face. When she had received the last sacraments, Father Ladinski, a Redemptorist, had her renew her vows of religion by pronouncing the consecrating formula with her. But he deliberately put the vow of obedience in the last place. When he arrived at the word Obedience, he stopped and said to the dying woman: “Sister Marie-Cecile, you have always loved obedience, so practise it now in this supreme moment: die now through obedience and the love of Our Lord.” At the same instant, she inclined her head and rendered her soul to God. This was on 30th March 1849, on the feast of the Compassion of the Blessed Virgin.

The virginal body of Sister Marie-Cecile, clad in her Redemptoristine habit, was then laid out in the monastery parlour. An incredible number of the faithful from all classes of society hurried to these precious remains and venerated the humble bride of Jesus crucified. Her funeral was more solemn than that of a princess. The divine Saviour glorified in this world she who had vowed all her love to Him.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.

Mother Maria-Benedicta of the Holy Trinity, O.SS.R. Superior of the Monastery of Vienna (1791 - 1852)

* * MONASTERY OF VIENNA * *

Superior of the Monastery of Vienna [1]
Born Maria Rizy

Sister Maria-Benedicta Rizy was born in Vienna on 13th October 1791, and received the name of Maria at baptism. Her father was a lawyer and occupied an honourable rank in Viennese society. For two years, the young lady’s confessor was the Rev. Father Clement-Maria Hofbauer, now canonised. After his death, she entrusted the direction of her soul to Father Madlener, a man of great virtue, and finally, when her confessor had to change his residence, she chose as her spiritual guide the Venerable Father Passerat, the successor of the Rev. Father Clement-Maria Hofbauer, as Vicar General of the Redemptorists beyond the Alps.

It is not astonishing that under so holy a direction, the young Maria led a most exemplary life in the world. For a period of time she was the governess of the two daughters of Count Gilleis. The Countess and her two daughters, one of whom embraced the religious state, have retained a grateful memory of her. She herself, on 23rd December 1824, entered the little establishment founded by the Ven. Father Passerat and called Saint Mary of the Refuge, which was the origin of the first Redemptoristine monastery beyond the Alps. The Superior of that establishment was then a French woman called Eugenie Dijon, later Mother Marie-Alphonse of the Will of God. Maria Rizy had reached the age of thirty three. She was the fourth of the first Redemptoristines in Austria.

Her knowledge and talents were extraordinary. She spoke German, French, Italian, Latin and English fluently. Painting, drawing and music, both vocal and instrumental, were all familiar to her. She even excelled in musical composition and poetry. She was perfectly instructed in all the feminine works and in all the branches of teaching. Estate management, the management of livestock, gardening, culinary art, and even medicine and jurisprudence all fell within the circle of her learning. All these gifts the young Maria consecrated exclusively and forever to the glory of God and the good of her Order.

Something even more astonishing was that these gifts of the spirit in no way harmed the qualities of her heart. On the contrary, she was so sensitive to the ills of others that she experienced an almost irresistible attraction to helping her neighbour. Thus she would say quite rightly that God had given her, according to her own expression, a hospitable heart.

In the autumn of 1830, the two Mothers Eugenie Dijon and Antonia, Countess of Welsersheimb, went to St. Agatha of the Goths and were comprehensively instructed, in this Redemptoristine monastery, in all the practices of their Order, and they resided there until 8th February 1832. During their absence, and even after their return, Maria Rizy exercised the functions of Superior with great prudence and charity. It was she who took the first steps to introduce the Order of the Redemptoristines to Vienna. It was she who established the enclosure, and it was under her auspices that the first solemnity of the taking of the habit took place, on 25th January 1831. On that day she received the name of Maria-Benedicta of the Most Holy Trinity. As we know, the two absent Sisters received their habits in Rome itself from the hands of Cardinal Odescalchi. She herself made her profession on 30th January 1832, and on the following 25th February, when their first canonical election took place, she was named as Superior.

Then especially, it was a very hard task. In fact, everything had to be started and learnt: the choir office, the ecclesiastical chant, the observance of the Rules and Constitutions, the Ceremonial and the community customs. To these were added a multitude of material and financial difficulties. However, Mother Maria-Benedicta triumphed over everything and displayed an extraordinary skill, an admirable activity, and a confidence in God that nothing could shake.

She exercised this prodigious activity in spite of great infirmities, and what was even more precious, with a great calm and self-possession. She therefore succeeded in introducing a very exact observance, without, however, making herself odious or disagreeable to anyone. Her benevolence and affable manners helped her to win the sympathies of even those many people who, until then, had placed little esteem on religious in general and the Redemptoristines in particular.

We understand that after all this vocations began to multiply around her, coming from Austria, Saxony, Poland, Bavaria and Tyrol and even the Rhineland. Many of them even came from the ranks of the nobility. Mother Maria-Benedicta was thus able to attempt a new foundation in the little town of Stein, in the Diocese of Saint Hippolyte. She went there on 7th October 1839, bringing five religious choir Sisters and two converse with her. Several educandes soon joined her. This town of Stein was dear to the foundress, as she had spent a great part of her youth there and hoped to be very useful to it through the prayers of her Sisters. The revolution of 1848 was to dash all her hopes and suppressed this house just as it destroyed the one in the capital.

* * * * *

Mother Maria-Benedicta then withdrew with some of her Sisters to Eggenberg. The Princess of Lowenstein provided for her subsistence, and the Redemptorist Fathers lent them the help of their spiritual direction. Her hope of being reunited with her Sisters in another monastery was to be disappointed. She submitted in this too, to the will of God, and not long afterwards, saw in the aggravation of her infirmities, the heralding of her approaching end. On one occasion, during the night, she had to call the converse Sister who was taking care of her, and became the object of the special attention of Providence. Indeed, the converse, who herself was ill, was at that moment suffering an attack of nerves. “My God!” she cried out aloud. “You can see what my good Superior is suffering! She has made so many sacrifices for you, so give me the strength to come to her aid. If this is done, then I consent to suffer anew.” Her prayer was heard. She immediately recovered her strength, rendered the service required of her, and then fell prey again to her illness.

On 17th May 1852, Mother Maria-Benedicta received the last sacraments. She humbly asked pardon of the Sisters who had run to her from all sides. As if to reward her for her life of sacrifices, the divine Redeemer filled her at that moment with His heavenly consolations, and on the following day she went to sleep peacefully in the Lord. She was then in the 61st year of her age.

* * * * *

As a worthy daughter of Saint Alphonsus, Mother Maria-Benedicta was always inspired by a lively faith and a great spirit of prayer. The Divine Office was dear to her, and she would recite it fervently for the intentions of the Church. Like all the souls enraptured by the beauties of our holy faith, she would enthusiastically recite the Apostolic Symbol, and the touching mysteries of Religion filled her with the sweetest affections. Her delicate conscience made her avoid the least faults, but her filial confidence in God made her love Him as a Father. Finally, her extraordinary talents left her always humble and distrustful of herself, and in the example of her blessed Father, she showed herself always sweet and resigned in suffering, charitable towards her neighbour, and severe and mortified to herself. She most surely was one of the principal columns of the Redemptoristine Institute, and her intercession in heaven will continue to affirm it, propagate it, and make it work zealously for the salvation of souls..

Footnotes

[1] On the foundation of this monastery, see the work by Father Nimal, already quoted.

This necrology is translated from Fleurs de l'Institut des Rédemptoristines by Mr John R. Bradbury. The copyright of this translation is the property of the Redemptoristine Nuns of Maitland, Australia. The integral version of the translated book will be posted here as the necrologies appear.