The Marist Laity - Finding the way – envisaged by Marist Father Colin By Father Frank McKay sm
Introduction
You received around Easter the new Decreta Capitularia of the Society of Mary, No. 112 speaks of the responsibility of the Superior General and his Council and of the Provincial Superiors and their Councils to foster the development of the Third Order and lay Marist groups. The nature of the responsibility is specified when the decree goes on to speak of your duty to 'initiate reflection and research with the laity themselves on how to integrate lay Marists into the global mission of the Church in the way envisaged by Father Colin.'What paralyzes our capacity for action is the nagging doubt that we don't really know what that way is. With an assortment of various texts drawn largely from Origines Maristes, with snippets of what we have picked up of the relations of Colin and Eymard bubbling around in our unconscious, many of us have been inclined to clutch at the notion of Colin as visionary, which he was, and of his writings as prophetic, which they were. But 'visionary' is not a synonymn for opaque. And Colin is not prophetic in the way Ezechiel's vision of the four animals and a chariot by the ri er Chobar is prophetic. Such prophecies almostdefy exegesis. Colin is prophetic in the sense that he was a medium of Mary for us, indicating what she wanted and how we were to go about achieving it. He is prophetic too in the way he anticipated much that has been taken up by the contemporary Church.We sometimes speak as if the task to-day is to recover from obscurity and confusion what Colin really wanted for the Marist laity. But that task has been done not once but several times. It was done first by Alphonse Cozon in time for the Gen eral Chapter of 1880. It was done again by Brendan Hayes in the fifties in The Story of Father Colin's Third Order Rule and Pass ing on the Torch. It was done again by Jean Coste in his four lectures at the Third Order Congress in Rome in 1979, then again cursorily in his third lecture at Framingham in 1980. The vision of how to integrate lay Marists into the global mission of the Church in the way envisaged by Father Colin is available to us.
The challenge is rather the one made by Coste in his Allocution to the 1977 General Chapter: 'It is my profound belief that it is up to our own age to listen to the full power of the Founder's voice and to translate it into action.•i TO LISTEN, TO TRANS LATE. That is already beginning to happen in some Provinces. I am thinking of the Marian Mothers' groups in New Zealand and their appeal well beyond Catholic boundaries, of small beginnings of a new style of group in a secular university in Wellington, of a Marist parish in Gramercy, Louisiana, of what is happening in France, Germany and Fiji, areas about which I am as yet not fully familiar. I could also add the immense promise of provinces like Ireland and San Francisco which I have visited. To what has already been begun I will offer some concrete suggestions for further ways in which Colin's vision can be translated into action to-day, and as I think we will agree that is still largelyahead of us.
I should like to begin by offering a brief overview of how Colin's vision for the Third Order passed from the early ambiguity to the clarifications of his last years. I shall cut through the complexity of historical detail so as to place the emphasis on those aspects of the story most relevant to our task of discovering contemporary strategies. I will rely on therecent research of Eymard's most authoritative biographer, Donald Cave s.s.s. in Eymard: the years 1845-1851, published in 1969;2 Charles Girard's editions of Maristes laics: Recueil-index Mayetand the writings of Alphonse Cozon, all printed in 1988. I will also use the writings referred to earlier. The very full notes will allow those who wish to explore the sources more thoroughly to do so. Throughout I use the term Third Order because that is the term used for the most part in the documents. Later I shall suggest reasons it is no longer an appropriate title.
I. Historical Overview
First of all it is important to clear up the obscurities in the relationship between Eymard and Colin. What Eymard made of the Third Order is still prevalent and it is not at all what Colin wanted. Peter Julien Eymard was a young diocesan priest when on 20 August 1839 he entered the Society of Mary. Colin spoke admiringly of the tactful way he had wrung permission from a reluctant Bishop. Eymard became Colin's right hand man and in 1844 was appointed Provincial, which at that time was equivalent to being Vicar General. When Colin was away, Eymard acted for him and attended to the day to day administration.
There was in Lyons at the time a group of some fourteen young women called Les Vierges Chretiennes. When it was suggested to Colin that Eymard be appointed their Director he innocently appointed him to look after what was a small enough group. These women had been part of an attempt to form a Marist Third Order and their general idea was to live a form of religious life in the world, to be what to-day we would call a secular institute.4Eymard was a man who needed a ministry that was both personal and on a large scale, and he was an excellent organiser. Within a few days of being appointed Director in December 1845 he swung into action. He called a meeting and outlined his programme. In describing the four branches of the Society, Fathers, Brothers, Sisters and Third Order he said: 'Finally the Third Order, destined to live like religious in the world. That was fair enough for Les Vierges Chretiennes but too narrow as a conception of the Third Order. He continued 'The goal is first of all to honour and to imitate the poor and hidden life of the Most Holy Virgin...'
That remains part of the Marist charism but it is only part. Eymard also instructed the tertiaries to keep their affiliation secret. These threeemphases, the laity as a kind of religious living in the world, the centrality of Nazareth, and the secrecy, characterized Eymard's view of the Third Order throughout his time in the Society. And he left us these attitudes as a legacy.
Les Vierges Chretiennes was an elite group with strict criteria for membership. Again this was reasonable for such a group, but it was also characteristic of Eymard's outlook in these years. He was very successful and the group expanded rapidly. When he took over in 1845 it numbered fourteen. In June 1850 he was able to write to a friend: 'I direct at Lyons the Third Order of Mary and which already includes more than three hundred very pious members. Among them are some ecclesiastics and above all lay men.'
The first week of every month Eymard devoted about five days to the Third Order. He prepared conferences, wrote up the minutes of each meeting, and wrote numerous letters giving spiritual direction. He had a veritable passion for drawing up rules for the various fraternities and spent an enormous amount of time perfecting them.
Colin was unhappy with his Provincial. He had given him care of a small group of women and Eymard had turned it into a big movement. Eymard was more interested in pastoral ministry than administration. He had been Provincial for two years and during the last ten months of them he had worked with the Third Order. Colin decided to relieve him of his position and make him Assistant and Visitor. That would mean he would have to visit the various houses and would be taken away from the groups over which he had been presiding. Yet Eymard felt that in the Third Order he had found his vocation and was, as Cave says, 'its true interpreter.
The approbation of the Third Order in 1850 The question that interests us to-day is how did Colin regard the structure and nature of the Third Order as developed by Eymard? The first striking indication we have is Colin's reaction to the papal approval of the Third order secured by Eymard in 1850. The received version in the Society goes like this. A Marist home on furlough from Oceania, Father Bernin, was going down to Rome from Lyons. Eymard said to him 'Get what you can for the Third Order!' He meant indulgences, so lavishly bes towed at that time. In Rome Bernin went to an Oratorian, Father Theiner, a good friend of the Society. Theiner said: 'But you can't get indulgences for something that does not exist. The first thing is to get the Third Order approved.' Without too much trouble that was arranged. The approval was by accident and not foreseen by Eymard.
This account is found in Mayet's life of Eymard, still in manuscript. now available. It needs to be modified in the light of documents Bernin in fact took with him to Rome a letter Eymard wrote to Theiner giving a summary of the aims, rules andpractices of the Third Order and requesting certain indul- gences.' The upshot was that Theiner approached the relevant Roman congregations and on 8 September 1850 a petition was pre- sented to Pius IX. It claimed to express the wish of Father Colin, Superior General of the Society of Mary, and of Padre Carlo Eymard, Provincial of the same Society. Eymard's name of course was not Carlo and he had not been Provincial for four years. The errors were probably because of Theiner's lack of information. The approval was granted and the news sent to Eymard on 27 September 1850. Rome and its postal system move slowly; when the letter eventually arrived, Eymard steeled himself to break the news to Colin.
Colin was very angry. The approval had been gained in his name and without his consent. And he had played no part in preparing the submission. After a thorough examination of all the evidence, that available to Mayet and that available only later, Cave is of the opinion that the approbation was no acci dent but deliberately sought by Eymard. He argues that Eymard had every reason to believe that God had blessed his work for the Third Order, and he had already been opposed often enough by Colin and others to know that it was in jeopardy, The bold step of gaining papal approval would preserve the Third Order once and for all, even from Colin, Some personal anguish from Colin's reaction was inevitable, but he was prepared to pay the price.
The approbation of the Third Order had been in his mind for a long time. As early as 1846 he had tried to get it approved but Colin had opposed it and was quite dismissive.' 'Father Eymard is not used to these matters, his Rules are useless.
In 1850 Eymard was more determined. He confided in Mayet that he had gone to Fourviere to ask for two special favours for the New Year: The approbation of the Third Order by the Holy See, and the approbation of the Cardinal of Lyons in relation to his diocese. And he told Our Lady that for them he was prepared to suffer 'what you will and I submit in advance to any criticism, to any fulminations. And he knew from where they would come,
Eymard expressed regret that his action in 1850 had upset Colin and for the appearance of his name in the application without any kind of authorisation. But at no time did he dis claim responsibility for the Approbation. Colin's response was to move Eymard from Lyons, the heartland of the Third Order, and make him Superior of the College at La Seyne. 'Let the punish- ment fit the crime' as Gilbert and Sullivan would say. From now on Colin distrusted Eymard's methods. Eymard too had been shaken. The whole incident contributed to the foundation of the Blessed Sacrament Fathers.
THE CHAPTER OF 1854 The next significant indication of Colin's attitude to Eymard's Third Order was given at the General Chapter held at Puylata in 1854. Colin was resigning as General and Eymard pressed him to dispel, while he still had the authority of office, the widespread impression that he was opposed to the Third Order. Colin came over specially from La Neyliere, and Mayet, who was not a Capitulant, reported what Colin said. But a much more detailed account is to be found in the very full notes taken as Colin spoke.
Looking at all the sources it can be said that Colin's approval of Eymard's Third Order was at best ambiguous. He could not but support the general idea of the Third Order 'since I was the one who took the first steps at Rome.'i6 And naturally he approved of the prayers and sacrifices of Eymard's groups. But instead of praising Eymard's work directly he expressed himself evasively: 'What do we want? To spread what is good, to extend more and more the communion of saints. That's all, then let us support all Third Orders... everything that leads to the Heavenly Father.
More significantly he spoke of the briefs granting indulgences to the Third Order which he himself had obtained long before. But he made no reference either to those obtained by Eymard nor to the papal approbation of the Third Order in 1850.
And though he knew of Eymard's fondness for making rules and that his groups already had a rule he added: 'The Third Order will have its rules like the other branches of the Society. It enters, I believe, into the designs of God.•ia This shows quite clearly that he found the present situation unsatisfactory.
I believe that at the Chapter of 1854 Colin was stalling. Quite simply his thought on the Third Order was not yet sufficiently mature for him to make a statement in so formal a gathering as a General Chapter. Colin always had a sense that the right time to act in such important matters would be made known to him by Providence. He did not believe that time had come.
In support of this interpretation I would point to two references in the notes of his address: 'I complained a bit, I raised objections at the beginning because what was happening was anticipating my ideas. ('car il devanqait mes idees.') And'Let us not anticipate the moment of Providence. ('Ne devanqonspas les moments de la Providence.)•i The interpretation is con firmed by the fact that one reason he had given for wanting to resign as General in 1845 was to work on the Third Order.
Colin's procrastination has caused many problems for posterity. By 1854 he still had not written a set of guidelines for the Third Order, much less a Rule. A lot of the good to be done with the laity would have been left undone if Eymard had not filled the vacuum.Mayet wrote that the Chapter asked Eymard to give a conference on the Third Order to 'pay solemn homage to his. apostolic success' and that there was a general desire to have Eymard as Director-General of the Third Order.21 But there is no reference to either intention in the minutes of the Chapter nor in the very full notes to which I have referred. Cave's conclu sion is that Mayet, a close friend of Eymard, was drawing on an apochryphal source. Certainly Eymard himself did not 'conclude in any way that he himself would necessarily be called on to con tinue his work.'22 It is of interest that Coste in printing the Mayet extract in A Founder Speaks omits the reference to the Chapter's alleged intentions.Surprisingly Eymard professed himself satisfied with Colin's intervention. Saints no doubt are more easily satisfied in such matters than the rest of us, but he had little enough grounds for satisfaction. If the Third Order were merely a human invention it would be difficult not to feel sorry for him, espe cially after his immense and fruitful exertions. But Colin always regarded the Third Order as part of the work he had been given to do by Mary. His responsibility was to see it was carried out in the way he had always understood it. Meantime the only one who had done much in practice was Eymard. The Chapter accepted his rule provisionally.
The next twenty years were difficult ones for the Society. Favre's Constitutions and the way they were finally displaced by Colin's at the Chapter of 1870-72 is a saga well known to us. Mayet had played a large part in achieving a successful outcome, but he knew there was still a serious gap in the
Rule in regard to the Third Order. He spared no effort to remedy the deficiency· When he was preparing a new edition of his life of Captain Marceau he sent Colin a copy of the appendix describing the Third Order as it was when Eymard enrolled Marceau.
Colin could not accept the account of the origin of the Third order, much less the suggestion that the papal approbation of 1850 was a high point in its history. He replied to Mayet on 28 June 1872: 'Since the Third Order of Mary, being a continuation of the Society1of Mary itself (my italics) is not definitively organized, it is prudent to suppress what you have written in the Life of Captain Marceau. Later a complete note on the Third Order will be published.'25 Father Brendan Hayes wrote that Colin's reply 'placed beyond doubt that the existing organiza- tion did not correspond - at least in its entirety - to that envisaged in Our Lady's mission to Father Founder as he conceived it.'26 It also clarified his thought by linking the Third Order firmly with the Society.
On 21 February 1873 Mayet wrote to Colin with some directness: '...on the one hand you tell us that the Third Order, as it exists, does not entirely meet your views, and on the other hand you do not tell us what these views are. No one knows them. I, myself, who have had the happiness of living with you for a long time, of hearing everything and remembering much, would have very great difficulty in formulating your desires and plans...
As regards the salvation and sanctification of souls, Father, there is certainly in the Third Order a most powerful lever, a force as strong as it is gentle, to lift up peoples. The impor tant thing is to know God's will on this point, to find it out and to do it, nee plus, nee minus, nee aliter. Dear Father, have the goodness to offer yourself to the Blessed Virgin for this purpose, to put yourself in her hands as the pen in the hands of the writer, in one word: do what you can: she will do the rest.
Mayet knew a lot about Colin's views on the Third Order as the eleven volumes of his Memoires show. His letter was cal culated to provoke the old man into action. Urged on by men like Mayet, and by his own sense of personal destiny, Colin wrote to Mayet asking for the material of Eymard he had mentioned in a previous letter. '...I had commissioned this good father to direct the Third Order at Puylata. He directed it without coming to an understanding with me, according to his own personal and independent ideas, of which I had no knowledge. As I propose to leave a short notice on the Third Order myself, I earnestly desire, in order to avoid the danger of our contradicting one another, that you would obtain for me a copy of this good Father's work on the matter, and if this work corresponds with the original aim of the Third Order, I shall make it a duty and a pleasure to adopt it... My greatest desire is to be able to work at this task...after Easter and during the summer...at this serious matter of the Third Order.• a The letter expresses once again Colin's dissatisfaction with Eymard's way of doing things. But I do not think it demonstrates that Colin had no knowledge of. Eymard's writings. All it shows is that he did not have them to hand when he needed them.
MAYET'S LIFE OF EYMARD Mayet was unable to oblige so he sent Colin the sixth chapter of his manuscript life of Eymard. It consisted of some one hundred and ninety pages dealing with Eymard's work as Direc tor of the Third Order. Mayet was able to guess Colin's likely reaction when it was read to him, and asked Father Molino to read it with great circumspection. The reaction was more explosive than he had feared. Molino was allowed to read only the first seventy pages up to the Approbation in 1850. By then Colin had had enough. On 18 October 1873 Molino wrote to Mayet: 'Father Founder is not pleased at all...he condemns matter and form...He condemns the matter, because it is not the truth. In fact, Father Eymard was never commissioned by Father Founder to estab lish the Third Order, nor even to direct the Third Order etc. etc. And the Third Order which he has ostensibly formed and directed is an entirely different Third Order absolutely dif ferent from that which Father Founder had and still has in mind.'
Given the strength of Colin's feeling it may well be asked why he had not remonstrated more vigorously with Eymard in the hey-day of his Third Order. Colin's explanation as expressed in another letter of Molino to Mayet on 28 October 1873 was that he had noticed what was happening all right and had even protested. 'However, as Father Eymard acted a good deal on his. own, without seeking advice, Father Founder, in the interests of peace and awaiting the day of Providence, thought it prudent to let things take their course,'
In a reference to the Constitutions of the Fathers so recently approved by the General Chapter, Molino added: 'as he had let more important things take their course, for which the day of Providence has arrived,' Further 'the Third Order which exists is not at all, not at all what he conceives: And the Manual, such as it is, is not at all, not at all what he would wish etc...'
Molino read his letter to Colin before he sent it and Colin approved it.Eymard had left the Society in 1856 and was dead by 1868. It might be said that neither the Third Order in 1873 nor the Manual were as he left them. But both were his legacy and were profoundly influenced by him. One conclusion in Mayet's report (in which Molina's letters occur) is: 'It would be, to my mind, a great misfortune and an act of infidelity towards God and Mary, to fix the present position. The Third Order must be what God and Mary have willed, nee plus, nee minus, nee aliter.'
At last the day of Providence for which Colin had waited so long was at hand. On 4 September Fathers. Dauphin wrote: 'Father Founder always loves the Third Order with a very special love. He speaks of it continually, he blesses it with a most special affection... Father Girard tells me that his ideas are precise: only the work of drafting is needed.'34
Girard could speak with some authority. He had been Director of the Third Order before Eymard and had worked with Colin in modifying Pompallier's rigid rules for the Tertiaries of Lyons. But the matter was urgent. Dauphin added: 'If he does not do it nunc, we shall never repair this loss, never fully. That is my opinion, especially when I listen to what is being said around me. The Third Order will be crippled and will not have that great, vast scope which Rev. Father had in mind.
In the fifties Father Hayes commented: 'This is just what has happened historically, through losing sight of Father Founder's work in these closing years of his life.' Eymard's Third Order had held the field without serious opposition for too long to be easily dislodged.
On 14 September 1873 Colin's secretary Brother Jean-Marie wrote of the Founder's determination to complete his work: 'All his (Colin's) prayers, and mine also, are now for the rules of the Third Order.'38 Colin was also grateful for the prayers and sacrifices of the Tertiaries of Paris, as so spiritual a man would have been for those from any source. Finally the day so long delayed and looked for arrived. In April 1874 Colin dictated to Jean-Marie his key ideas on the Third Order. He explained these orally to Father Jeantin and asked him to write them up. He did so and Colin approved what was written. Colin had used a similar procedure in writing De Societatis Spiritu. Jeantin's text was printed in May 1875 under the title 'Con stitutiones Confraternitatis seu Sodalitatis sub AuspiciisB. M. v. ad Conversionem Peccatorum et ad Justorum Perseverantiam.' It is of interest that in Eymard's application to Rome in 1850 the title was 'Third Order of Mary for the interior life.' (Tiers-Ordre de Marie de la Vie interiure [sic]).
A Latin preface to the Constitutions tells us of Colin's sense of duty to give each branch of the Society its Constitutions and that his soul would never rest until the last of the Constitutions, those for the Third Order were completed.
With a fine sense of understatement we are informed that they were 'diu et mature perpensas' (long and maturely weighed). Of immense significance is the following: 'Sequens expositio nihil aliud est quam Constitutionum presbyterorum Societatis Mariae quoddam complementum.' 'The following exposition is nothing other than as it were a completion of the Constitutions of the priests of the Society of Mary'. That said it is understandable that they are so short. There was no need to repeat what had been said so carefully in the Constitutions of 1872.
The document continues the earlier rejection of Eymard's Third Order. Instead of referring to the approbation by Pius IX in 1850 it refers to the approval of the whole Society by Gregory XVI which embraced also the Third Order. Colin's view of his Confraternity is very different from that of Eymard's Third Order. He sees it as an organic part of the Society with the same spirituality, the same spirit and the same mission. That is why his new Constitutions are 'nihil aliud est quam Con stitutionum presbyterorum Societatis Mariae quoddam com plem ntum.' Eymard on the other hand saw the Third Order assomething outside the Society. That is why his most authorita tive biographer, Cave, can say that he never saw his work for the Third Order as implementing the ideas of the Founder but regarded himself as 'the founder and legislator' and as having a certain personal control.40 That is the basic reason why to-day the Eymardian Third Order is unsatisfactory for the Society. Our New Constitutions (No. 6) affirm that the Constitutions Colin gave us remain: 'the authentic expression of the nature and ends of the Society of Mary'. In making that recognition they are true to the call of Vatican II for religious institutes: 'Therefore the spirit and aims of each founder should be faithfully retained...' And the new Decreta Capitularia, No. 112, calls for the integra tion of 'lay Marists into the global mission of the Church in the way envisaged by Father Colin.' The excellence of Eymard's work, its effectiveness, the high personal regard in which he was always held by Colin, are not in doubt. What is being claimed is that there are special graces given to an institute when it is true to its distinctive call in the Church and that those graces are lost when it departs from it.
When we look at Eymard and Colin from the perspectives we have to-day, it is not difficult to see major differences of outlook between them. For us the dominant Marist myth is not Nazareth, as it was for Eymard, but Mary among the Apostles. The contemporary Marist goes out on mission (even if it is just out- side the front door) in the spirit of Nazareth, but he goes out. The very first number of Colin's Constitutions for his con fraternity places the emphasis on Mary's burning desire that all men and women be saved. This characteristic perspective, so quickly established, is sustained throughout the text. In this brief overview it is not necessary to develop the remarkable openness and inclusiveness of the text. Suffice it to say that much of what Colin wrote still speaks to us to-day. His suggestion for example that children in the womb can be enrolled in the prayers and merits of the confraternity has been taken up by the young travellers (gipsies) in the West of Ireland, as it has been welcomed by more sophisticated parents in the United States·, Australia and New Zealand. At a deeper level there is the thrust to a Church in the image of Mary in Nos. 31 and 32. And we remember that when for a brief moment such a Church was realized in John XXIII it had immense evangelising power. Even Krushev in the Kremlin said: 'I am not a Catholic, but I have great respect for this Pope John.' And New Zealanders will be interested to learn that it was Pope John who attracted both of James K. Baxter's parents to the faith.
With the Constitutions of 1875 Colin had greatly clarified his mind for his contemporaries. But more was needed if the inheritance he held in trust was to be handed on in all its richness. The decisive step was taken in October 1874 when Alphonse Cozen came to La Neyliere. cozen knew Colin intimately during the last four years of the Founder's life and recorded his most cherished ideas on the co-adjutor Brothers and the Third Order. To Cozen we owe what is in effect Colin's last will and testament on the Third Order. And he recorded not only the ideas; frequently the Founder's words were taken down as hespoke.
Colin liked the way Cozon grasped his thought and when the Manual for the Brothers was produced he approved of it. In the autumn of 1874 Colin asked for him several times. Cozon procrastinated because he suspected Colin wanted to give him a task beyond his capacity, and it might be viewed unfavourably by the other Fathers. But as he said he was prepared to be humiliated if that was what God wanted. Colin asked him to pres ent his mature thought on the Third Order. He offered Cozon some general considerations and advice for the composition of a new manual, since he did not like the one in existence.42Cozon was amazed at Colin's zeal for the Third Order which he found truly astonishing. He believed the reason was 'that he had at heart to leave behind him the proper spirit of the Holy Virgin in this work, a spirit which he saw as deficient in an essential point, and his anxiety had no other motive.'
Colin led off by deploring the rationalist spirit of those confreres who saw the Society as an ordinary enterprise. If it was merely that it would pass away but 'the Society ought to be a lasting work in the Church'. 'They imagine that the Third Order is a human creation, that is to have little faith. It is a work which ought to last. It began from the beginning.
It was blessed at Rome. It received a brief from Gregory XVI. The constitutions were made when I was a curate.' He continued 'This idea of the Third Order is one of the ideas which has always preoccupied me a great deal; it has been one of the first ideas of the Society, and those ideas I have kept.'
When Cardinal Castracane had expostulated in Rome all those years ago, Colin said he showed that he had understood what was being said: 'Then the whole world will be Marist, even the Pope!' But now 'the rest of you, no; you raise objections, you are rationalist.
Colin also warned Cozon 'You will have to become a saint to do what I am asking you.' But he had to do all he could right now. Later the work would grow. 'God will raise up someone, men do not become great all at once, neither do works.'49 If it depended on Colin, 'I should like to enrol the world under the banner of the Holy Virgin. The world is going to the bad.Colin recommended that Cozon consult with David and Jeantin, but not with everybody, because not everyone understood. Cozon left with a feeling of exhilaration. a Founder and with a Founder's charisma.
Cozon has some interesting things to say about the Constitutions Colin wrote for his Confraternity. He remarks for instance that those who had heard Colin speak on the subject would recognise in the text ideas they had already heard from him orally. But Cozon's best observations are contained in his commentary on Colin's Constitutions which he included in the Manual he wrote for the Confraternity. Writing of one element he regarded as capital he said:
According to the idea of the Very Reverend Father Founder, the Third Order ought not to be confined within the limits of the Society. It ought, in a sense, to be a work outside of the Society, to which the Society will communicate its spirit, the spirit of the Holy Virgin. Its devel- opment ought not to be limited to the dimensions of the Society. It ought not to remain in our hands, but pass to others. It ought not be an essential mechanism of the Society, nor revolve around it as a planet around the sun, but ought to radiate freely in the Church. It would be wrong to consider it as a valuable means for aiding the Society by interesting the pious faithful in its works: it is rather the medium for transmitting farther the impetus received from Mary, so that, passing through the Fathers and the Tertiaries, it might keep on going and finally disappear at the farthest reaches, so to say, of the Church, without any personal consideration.si
That is a passage central to our understanding of the Marist lay movement to-day, and it is a good touchstone to judge a new initiative. Illuminating too is the comment that since Mary is the Mother of all Christians the Society ought to be the society of all Christians, both just and sinners. 'By its very nature, it ought to seek to be for the world what Mary is for the world.'52 Cozon was well aware that many associations existed in his time and that the Third Order as it was then, was little different from them.53 But Colin's conception was very different and it was well adapted to the needs of the Church.
A very practical comment was that Colin envisaged a movement which would have 'the vastest means of propagation, and that could happen only when the pastors found it was to their advantage. I believe one reason for the great success of the Marian Mother's groups in New Zealand is that from the beginning they have followed that advice.Finally Cozon answered two objections to what Colin was saying. First of all that his plan was not practical and secondly Colin did not always express himself as clearly as he had done in his last years. To the first he replied 'Let us listen to him affirming that he has not founded just any work but the work which God wanted. Listen to him affirming that the Society has received a fruitful blessing to water the whole world with the (graces) of which Mary is the source..'' Secondly if the thought of the Founder had not always been clear in the past 'it was perfectly clear during the last years of his life.''' Further if the formulation had not always been clear the sub-stance was plain.
When we come to interpret the earlier texts on the Third Order I believe we should view them from the perspective of Colin's last years. Then they will be seen to be all of a piece.
Cozen had done what he could. But he confessed he had not been able to find ways of implementing the thought of the Founder. There was simply too much opposition from several of the Fathers. The later history of his manual is dealt with by Jean Coste in his Third Framingham lecture, which has been dis- tributed. Each age presents its proper obstacles. I believe the time has come, as Coste has said, to listen to the full power of the Founder's voice and to translate it into action. To suggest how that might be done is the task of the rest of this paper.
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