Zacchaeus, come down quickly;
because I must abide at thy house. ( Luke 19, 50)
The vocation of humanity is not suffering but joy
it is not the guilt of sin,
but freedom of thought and shared enjoyment. [Robert Misrahi ]
The denominations of 15 August 1963 brought me back Rosemere, the parent of the Province of Montreal. I was responsible for recruiting high school. My friend's brother Louis-Denis, was the primary care. In addition, I was hired by the Catechetical Office of the Diocese of St. Jerome, two days per week, location of the new catechism in the schools of the diocese.
Under the breath of Vatican II
Breath of Vatican II had raised any new initiatives in the pastoral diocese St. Jerome in my province and Montreal community. The Great Commission had mobilized all diocesan services and led to new movements of solidarity among the clergy, religious congregations of the diocese and the lay people involved in various Catholic action movements.
The Yearbook of the Institute of Brothers of the Sacred Heart which annually recounts the deeds of the provinces community refers to the year 62-63, Montreal Province, an upsurge of activities and initiatives to inform and educate brothers the spirit of the council. Cf p. 1962-63 Montreal Province 161-162 - Extracts
The new catechism was, perhaps, with the liturgical reform, the most sensitive sign in these times of profound renewal of faith and religion in Quebec.
The Office catechetical provincial, newly created by Bishop Coderre Bishop of Saint John in 1962, undertook the creation of new manuals catechesis oriented introduction to the Christian life (Come to the Father - Celebrating its wonders ...) which replaces the small catechism of Quebec.
Universities of Montreal, Laval, UQTR offer during the holidays catechism classes for teachers. Offices catechesis arise in every diocese, as well as different forms of combinations diocesan religious communities. The diocese of St. Jerome was particularly active in this field.
In this environment driven by the energies of a profound renewal that I was called to work.
Recruiter primary
One morning in early September, the classes being taken in all schools, brother Louis, the prosecutor's parent Rosemere, calls me and gives me a big smile the keys to a brand new Pontiac that he had purchased ($ 2,500) for me at a garage in Ste-Therese.
At that time yet, especially driving a car and have one available to almost regular community was a privilege reserved for the province, to the steward of the house mother and recruiter. In recent years, however, had increased the driver's license among brothers. So while I taught in the novitiate, I took my driver's license to troubleshoot the headmaster of St-Pie de Bagot, who needed a teacher of geometry. Every Monday, I went Mount Sacred Heart at St. Pius to give it my way. Subsequently I made a lot of other useful racing at the provincial house. Of privilege, the car was passed to the rank of the service, a tool like many others.
This morning I drove there for St-Jerome, I had an appointment in the afternoon with the team from the Diocese Catechetical Office.
I had planned to take this morning to initiate me in my role as a recruiter at the primary level. Brother Louis Denis, who was responsible, for I know not why, had in effect abandoned. I therefore accept the appointment to two levels, primary and secondary. As well start my initiation immediately.
The Sisters of the Sacred Heart ran the boys' school in St. Janvier. Wearing a tie and black suit was not yet widespread outside the diocese of Montreal, I was wearing the cassock, I was welcomed with open arms. The Sisters of the Sacred Heart also ran in St. Antoine school close to that of brothers. I was in the country known. Boys grades 6 and 7 were grouped in one class. I proposed to sustain them for about an hour on the religious life.
What they say and especially how to tell them?
Recruiter's brother in the tradition
According to tradition as always, brother recruiter met with students sixth and seventh ones twice a year and that both in the schools run by the brothers that in schools in nearby villages. Between recruiters from different communities as we had naturally shared the hunting grounds. Thus, when a community was the only one to hold a school in a city or a larger village, all schools in surrounding villages were part of its territory. The recruiter had access to these schools and it was generally expected and well received. Sharing the same amicably was established for schools on the island Montreal.
Each recruiter had his stuff and his bait. He had to identify gifted children and create links with them who has an interest in the vocation of a brother and possibly prepare the entry Juvénat. Gave some pictures to everyone or to those who best answered the questions asked. There was talk of vocation, this kind of mysterious fate predetermined at birth by God himself. It was very important to discover and follow his vocation.
Other recruiters posing little tests and promised to send the results by mail to all who ask. The pre-Christmas visit was intended to collect the names of the most talented students in order to communicate with them during the holidays or their birthday.
The second meeting after Christmas was primarily an entry to Juvénat Easter (1) or the end of August. Parents of students most interested were then encountered. The interviewer tried to clarify the conditions of their entry Juvénat. Above all, he never failed say that future candidate and his family he had in high esteem, he would pray for them. The student was invited to correspond with the recruiter.
Several recruiters were provided with an 8 or 16 mm projector. They showed the class pictures of Juvénat, sports were practiced there, teaching you and also gave them the mission countries where the community was working. Elephants and African lions were good bait for hunting vocations.
In schools run by the brothers, the scenario was similar, except that the recruiter was working closely with the brothers holding classes in grade 7 (and, where appropriate, those in grades 8 and 9) who had at heart the promotion of the vocation of Brother .
This system worked very well since the honor rolls found in The Voice Mount Sacred Heart and promoted by the provincial superior during his visits to homes or at annual retreats mentioned the name and origin of each new recruit registered in Juvénat. In the 40 and 50, of Granby was Juvénat and often exceeded one hundred recruits per year. In the province of Montreal, more recently, it was a bit more modest, they celebrated the coming of the 75th new juniors.
At a time when there were only very few institutions of secondary education from traditional colleges, the application for an extension of studies beyond primary school was great. The recruiters were welcome. The Juvénat crammed with topics and the province registered a profit every thirty new year, the provincial brother could meet the demands of the bishops who wanted establish new schools run by the brothers in their diocese. The community was expanding and carousel each September resumed his "merry-go-round."
As to the traditions of training in the novitiate, I was a little uncomfortable in front of the system organized by the standards of commercial marketing or recruiting practices by professional sports clubs. How, without misrepresentation without bidding misplaced, could we make the religious life to young people grades 6 and 7, and especially how to make this life attractive for them?
other hand, we could not withdraw, recruitment was vital for the survival of the community.
The Gospel, a good fishing rod
To be in the wind of the council and respect my core beliefs so I decided to use the Gospel as much as possible beginning of my speech on religious life. The story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19) acted as my first test.
"He was very, very small. His name was Zacchaeus. Jesus came into the village where he lived. There was a large crowd. Zacchaeus wanted to see Jesus. It was so small that everyone hid the view. "
What would you do for him? He was cunning. What did he do, he really wanted to see Jesus?
" I asked my father to take me on his shoulders. " said one," I passed between the legs of large to go in the front row said another . "The whole class laughed. "I'd mounted in a tree" said another.
is the answer I expected. I continued to act out the scene with an emphasis on the gaze of Jesus up to the tree where Zacchaeus was, on the attentive crowd at the invitation of Jesus, which was addressed personally to him, the tiny, little Zacchaeus. Jesus, whom the crowds cheered, would now eat humble home in the tiny Zacchaeus.
And now these young boys no end to list what they have done to welcome Jesus. I hung up at the word vocation, brothers and big sisters who opened their homes to welcome Jesus. The smiles of the classroom teacher sister, who had stayed to listen to my lecture, applause. I was invited to return. I was happy. "The beginner's luck."
In fact, I always had fun talking about calling on primary school children, their comment on the Gospel. But to bring them to Juvénat! The following year, a young boy from St-Janvier made his entrance at Juvénat Chertsey. I pinned on my list of conquests. I think it went up novitiate.
He needed more than words to fill the Juvénat. To realize and embody my flights evangelical vocations sonorants and cents, "I applied the formula of Catholic Action, action on like by like. With the collaboration of master trainers (brother Jean-Pierre and Jean-Rémy Chertsey Rosemere) I arranged with the candidates for whom I discerned a certain potential for religious life, stays at a weekend juniorate. It was concrete. It was a winning formula. In the directory the following year, we mentioned that forty seventy-five recruits had a weekend stay at Juvénat.
The following year I was given an assistant in the person of brother John Lionel, alias Gilles Vincelette, who had in the arts of many strings to his bow. He was also attached to the Pastoral Care of Vocations for the Diocese of Joliette. Then it was the brother Anatole, my first manager in St. Victor, who came to place themselves humbly before my orders. He liked driving the car, I gave him to traverse the most remote parishes of the province. Finally we were a good team. Lionel Jean-brother in the east and primary schools of Montreal, brother Anatole in the North. Brother Charles, the province Arthabaska and former missionary in Madagascar assured Albertius correspondence and brother took care of all print advertising vocation.
Recruiter at secondary level.
The few recruits who came from the school were a delicacy for the recruiter and the young nuns. Secondary schools multiplied. Several of them also provided the classical. There were more and more brothers who taught in high school. A youth could now extend free secondary studies without going through the juniorate or the seminar. The formula juniorate closed to return to the family was increasingly criticized.
The future of the community resides, it was thought, in vocations ripened by time and chosen a more informed decision. Some brothers who taught high school enjoyed a rising real youth 9th, 10th and 11th years. They knew the works involved in important ecclesial and even managed to register at Juvénat one or two of these candidates "choice."
In short, it was comforting and reassuring to think that we could draw many recruits new grounds to the sea and it was enough to tend the nets to make miraculous catches.
My mission was to tighten the net of the Lord in these new waters. How?
After multiplying my comings and goings across the province, after Easter 1964, about nine o'clock in the morning, I rang the school Pius IX, based in Montreal North. It was a school run by lay teachers of the MCSC. I ask Mr. Tremblay see the school principal. After ten or fifteen minutes they brought me into his office. Tentatively, I am applying:
" I am a brother of the Sacred Heart charged by my community WORK OF VOCATIONS (at the time it was no longer wearing the cassock outside our schools on the island of Montreal. " I would like to speak to students of 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th years to talk about their religious vocation. "
A moment of silence that indicates a malaise . I guess his thoughts. " He just asked the boys if they want to 'make brothers'. Good luck! "
He pulled himself together. Polite, he inquired of my community, "Ah yes ... Brothers of the Sacred Heart in Jonquière there were ... "I him was that the Brothers of the Sacred Heart had until recently a school in Montreal North, he could face the brother Albertius eds. or brother Sylvester. He takes a deep breath and then continued: "I am sympathetic to your cause . Would you meet all the classes? Uh! Yes ... There are thirty! It should first contact Mr. Douville, my assistant, who handles the 8th and 9th grades.
Mr. Douville is direct. He will talk to the chaplain. I feel that refers to a hot potato. Mr. Payer, is chaplain at the school for only six months. I refer to MX professor of religious education in Grade 8. This professor also teaches geography. Religious education is to him that additional task. He willingly accepts I let "her periods" of religious education. However, we should talk to the holders of each class.
I returned to see Mr. Douville to give me the schedule of courses and the names of the holders of each class. A grid spread over eight days so that we can build a program that fits in the days of the week. Must be calculated. I go to the staff room to meet the teachers involved. I am a foreigner. I catch one or two. I debit my project. There is almost always a mischievous little smile that said that my naivety was captured. Finally I succeed to settle a schedule that will occupy me with idle time for nearly two weeks. Some teachers offered me to stay in the classroom or inform me they will. Which cools a bit my spontaneity.
The traditional lecture course scientific and commercial course, high, low ... Specialized teachers in French, mathematics, English or Latin or religious education classes before moving on schedule complex.
In class, people listen carefully for about ten minutes while casting a glance at the rear class, question to identify the supervisor or join complicity.
How to approach these people? This is another aspect not as simple as it sounds. I tried everything, the whole Gospel of Zacchaeus to the miraculous catch, the whole Bible, from Abraham through Joseph in Egypt, Moses who fight against the golden calf to Job on his dunghill .
At that time, the vogue was for singers. I also hung Vigneault, Leveille, Ferré, Brel Bécaud as impresarios of my post. But then we had to bring a tape recorder, provide extension cords, get the silence and brews comments until the clock or the bell signals the end of the course. I even introduced the Beatles to grade nine students of the school-François Perrault, this time with a gramophone that sounded the sheet. I'll let you guess the results.
Sow under these conditions casts doubt on the harvest, even if we have a faith to move mountains. " He had to find something else. Inventing for these new times another manual, another fishing technique, another vehicle the Good News that the voice of authority that demands silence.
camps weekend
camps weekend grew especially in secondary schools run by brothers or sisters.
collusion with the brothers Antonio and Guy Maurice, who taught at secondary school Best, also with my brother blood brother Denis (Clement) who had organized a camp in Chertsey for the Crusaders St. Francis Solano where he taught, we have assembled a score of young 8th and 9th grades from different schools in Montreal for a camp "vocation" in Chertsey.
The extension of concepts from the first breath of the council wanted us to give the greatest possible extension to the term vocation and therefore the program of this four-day camp. We talked about vocation to Christian life, all vocations, of the vocation to marriage. He had put on white gloves. We talked little of religious life. Without expect that the council had opened the apostolic mission of every Christian and hence any vocation. To be consistent with this basic strategy we also invited a couple, Ginette and Guy, to join the team of five brothers, leaders of this camp. This couple we had been suggested by Brother Guy-Marie, in recent years, organized camps mixed (scandal and surprise) with students of the College Roussin and their friends involved in a pastoral team, perhaps JEC.
The camp has worked so well, we have organized a second Easter and a third at the end of the school year. Other laity had also added to the group facilitators or came for an activity more accurately.
The program included many outdoor activities which everyone participated. We had gone to cut a Christmas tree in the mountains, we made trips on country roads, singing songs to respond and a Good Friday we had painfully up the mountain two large tree trunks that were to form the foot and arms of the cross erected on the white snow. Etc.. A directory of solidarity activities that we drew in the memories of our formative years. Among these activities, there was 
dishes, of course, and a few simple tasks that can be shared. There was also a team sport, the ball flying with a privileged document. Then each day, as much as possible in the evening, a Eucharistic celebration stretched, stripped of all its trappings, permitted trade on the gospel and came to enshrine the theme of the camp. We were in the wind of time.
dishes, of course, and a few simple tasks that can be shared. There was also a team sport, the ball flying with a privileged document. Then each day, as much as possible in the evening, a Eucharistic celebration stretched, stripped of all its trappings, permitted trade on the gospel and came to enshrine the theme of the camp. We were in the wind of time. was the time when the Father Levesque in Quebec City was in vogue. The influence of his school had also popularized the "group dynamics". The time of reflection in silence to own retreats was scrapped. The facilitators also participated in these games of truth. We have on several occasions, with or without the youth, spent the night exchanging perceptions that each had the others.
These activities provided youth as leaders in bubble self-confidence and invited to the engagement.
According to the technique already tested by the Catholic Action at the end of camp we applied the "see, judge, act" in a dynamic exercise score camp and action to take.
communities bear much of the expenses of the camp. Campers had to pay $ 6 _ for three or four days, housed and fed. The animators even lay volunteers and parents were helped to transport youth.
After two or three sides of this caliber, with a more loyal group of campers, they formed a kind of club that we called "The Companions Life . It was a sharing club, a sort of grassroots community without specific frameworks, seeking to deepen the Christian faith in the spirit of Vatican II and to live intensely for two or three days.
The brothers were involved in teaching activities of the club and helped to recruit her as an extension of Christian education they provided to the school. The club was supported by the implementation of vocations as a new experience in recruitment. Any formal invitation to join the Religious life was suspect. It will be kept. I do not think any of this young group has entered the juniorate. It had not sought directly and we do it is not formalized. The spirit was the seed of the gospel to every wind.
Club " Companions Life" has remained a little over two years. The animators use change has been the main cause of the cessation of activities of this club and its extinction.
These practices have been to me and probably for all leaders an introduction to a new form of pastoral work in a spirit of free and open to all forms of life, all life. And I made a confirmation that germinated in me for some time and who later became a sort of irreducible belief that life is stronger than all the insularity that claim to control it, it pierces sclerosis heavily calcified, it Wells, renewed through the toughest opacities. The expected results of our actions is less important than the share of energy of life we have taken in engaging them.
find renewed life and raise instinctively forms of engagement (vocation) most appropriate to radiate and triumph. Is not 'unicum necessariun ?
At school Pius IX, some similar camps weekend gave birth to a group of teenagers who met at a variable rate for nearly two years. Was exchanged, we listened Gilles Vigneault, Claude Leveille, Jacques Brel, Léo Ferré sometimes ... Life, the self, freedom and opportunity faith in God were central to these exchanges. This was the initial core group, who two years later, when we leave is granted, a center based "vocational" to young people in Montreal North. We'll talk.
The Pastoral Care of Vocations
Among the innovations of this time, we must mention the Association of Educators Brothers Vocations Ministry founded around 1962 by Brother Leander Dugal, csv. The association brought together the brothers recruiters from all communities located in Quebec, about fifty brothers. The association held two meetings per year, usually at home mother of one of the communities that participated. These meetings were a forum where everyone could share its publications or to share a special experience in the exercise of its functions. There was always this occasion "a dish" a guest speaker who told us the latest developments of a pastoral nature that emanated from the council. The Association also intervened with the authorities and religious schools to facilitate and expand the possible action of the brothers vocational educators in the field.
Among the innovations of this time, we must mention the Association of Educators Brothers Vocations Ministry founded around 1962 by Brother Leander Dugal, csv. The association brought together the brothers recruiters from all communities located in Quebec, about fifty brothers. The association held two meetings per year, usually at home mother of one of the communities that participated. These meetings were a forum where everyone could share its publications or to share a special experience in the exercise of its functions. There was always this occasion "a dish" a guest speaker who told us the latest developments of a pastoral nature that emanated from the council. The Association also intervened with the authorities and religious schools to facilitate and expand the possible action of the brothers vocational educators in the field.
For the day of notices on the second or third Sunday in May, I believe, the Association had received as brothers climb into the pulpit. Imagine, after the readings and the sermon of the holy priest, a preacher we had to extend the improvised mass at least ten minutes to talk about vocations to these practitioners of varying caliber. It's stamped in the pews. This ten minutes seemed to stretch an hour was too much. He annoyed everyone. We wanted so much! Too! Vocations do not germinate in vinegar!
Association brothers' original recruiter is now merged that of fathers. Dugal's brother assured its Chairman for over ten years. He was also one of the first to create a vocational center for young adolescents. Several other communities followed suit.
This association has been instrumental in bringing together communities in the area vocational previously practiced a policy of competition and "turf". She was also an excellent bench for learning and openness to new theological perspectives from the council.
These "Agents of the Pastoral Care of Vocations" as they were designated now, were a leaven in the dough that allowed Quebec as in the educational domain as vocational challenges of new times that showed up when our horizons.
Review
My allegiance to the Pastoral Care of Vocations in the middle school has been the most difficult mission of my religious life. Febrile time activities, to meet enormous challenges in a world all in flux. Time of uncertainty, those of any pregnancy. No indication tag paths to trace, no expertise was not supporting the decisions. Time of trial and error. Time as large naivete and expectations that far exceeded my skills and possible changing world. What could we have done better? More fit? Multiply ceremonial and sacramental? Better target programs and speeches to the commitment in religious life? ...
The harvest was not perfect the appointment. It would be interesting to measure the retention rate of subjects who entered community in the 60 to 70. In 1970 we had for all practical purposes eliminated the position of recruiter. Beginning in 1975, the annual inflow to the novitiate does not exceed five candidates province. After forty years of estrangement I think this reaction is common to all communities (scarce inputs and outputs open valves) was instinctive and healthy .
Instinctive , we only look at results almost identical everywhere to see it is not an epiphenomenon whose variations depend on the fingering of a superior, the charisma of a recruiter or accuracy of the formula nor the degree of enthusiasm of community members from to another. When the tsunami happened we do not wonder what caused it or how it might stop. It is a natural phenomenon that nothing could stop it. So is this the collapse and famine that have affected our communities in the last slope of the 60s. Survival instincts have done the right thing to do.
This reaction was healthy, because if one believes that the Church should change course and open to modernity, this operation required to save the mission, as outlined in the crudely Gospel (Mt 5.29 to 30) that pulls the eye is cut and the arm that scandalized. Can you imagine what would have been the Quiet Revolution with the maintenance of power and domination of religious communities in the areas of health and education?
The time was ripe for other forms of engagement. Artificially maintaining enrollment in these communities would only delay the arrival of missionaries better prepared to meet the needs of these new times. Wheat planted must die to produce.
I read recently in The Link , published weekly for the Brothers of the Sacred Heart, that an icon of vocations circulated in homes as before the Blessed Sacrament, Forty Hours assured by relays of perpetual adoration in the diocese. This icon had become object of devotion. Its passage was the opportunity to pray the Lord of the vines to send new laborers to work the harvest. The hope of survival, deceived by the numbers and new growth, now pulled its freshness and vitality tanks divine. The Work of vocations became a waiting time of hope and prayers.
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(1) The entrance to the Juvénat Easter was to pluck young vocations before recruiters spend seminars that they made their rounds during the summer holidays. (Tip old monk)
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DIRECTORY 1963-1964
No. 58
At the institute in general, three events marked the year 1963-1964: a) the general chapter, it was then the general chapter of the longest history of the institute raised the question by the Council is well reflected, but was not ready to give the extra push. This will be the next batch of general chapter, in four years, b) the election of the brother Julius as general upper Ledoux c) the transfer of large Albano novice and student of Jesus Magister at home generally.
In Canadian provinces, there were seven houses closures.
The brothers of the Belgian Congo have withdrawn from their duties following the outbreak of unrest.
There was the opening of a new mission in faraway Australia.
What dominated the school plan in Quebec, was the creation of the Ministry of Education and the "opération55", that is to say, the regionalization of schools. Columnists commenting on the impact of these changes on traditional teaching brothers.
previous seven Canadian provinces:
- 1517 professed
- 82 novices
- 1331 juniors
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