Bronchain Meditations: St. Damien of Molokai

St. Martin's Scribe would like to take this opportunity to join with the Universal Church in rejoicing in the canonization of St. Damien of Molokai. Let us meditate on the holy example of St. Damien.

Father Damien

Lives there not, still replaced as time goes by,

Some man who wears the wide earth's crown of woe,

Pain's Victim-Priest, a shadow cast below

By Him that Victim-Priest enthroned on high?

Mounts not that man elect his Calvary

Like Christ by choice not doom? If this be so

The world's blind prophets ill the graces know

Men reap from that perennial agony!

Damien! no name like thine exalts old story!

Dread Leper-Saint, pray well for me and mine,

Both here and harboured in the eternal glory;

For this is sure -- that living woes like thine

Are knit so closely with Christ's Death divine

They draw from it some power expiatory.

Thy greatness is our vaunt; vainglorious thought

To thee finds access never: that is well!

The Spirits that whisper round thy midnight cell

Waft thee a dew of purer solace fraught

With Eden's sweetness only -- solace caught

From bowers where love and meekness blended dwell,

And whence not boasts but songs thanksgiving swell --

Love-songs of martyr souls. This fight well fought

Thy death will crown; thy greatness then beknown:

Who then shall lead thee to thy paradise?

Those saints who best true joy, true beauty see

When hid by mists of earth -- Cecilia, she

Whose bridal wreath angels discerned alone,

And Agnes angel-veiled from fleshly eyes.

Poems from the Works Of Aubrey De Vere (1904)

Method

Show/Hide

Servant of God

Charles Louis Laurent Bronchain was born of excellent parents, September 4, 1829, at Frameries, near Mons in Belgium. From his early boyhood he was distinguished for his piety. As an altar boy he was modest and recollected, and was wont after serving Mass to remain as close as possible to the priest. Being asked why he acted thus, he replied: "I do this, because I wish to be nearer to the good God." When he saw people going to holy communion, he was filled with a holy envy, and would say to himself: "When shall I also have the happiness of receiving our Lord?" We may easily imagine his joy and happiness when this favor was vouchsafed to him for the first time. When out walking with his playmates, he always managed to bring them near a church and induced them to enter it with him to pay homage to our divine Saviour in the Sacrament of His love.

During the six years he studied at the "Petit Seminaire de Bonne Esperance," he was universally admired and respected for his modesty, piety, charity, and other virtues. Heeding the divine call to a more perfect life, he, with the consent of his parents, renounced the world and the brightest prospects of success, and entered in 1850 the Redemptorist Novitiate at St. Trond. The following year he made his profession and was sent to Wittem to prosecute his studies. As novice and student, Louis Bronchain was a model to his companions in regular observance, charity, love of prayer, and study, and self-denial. After his ordination in 1857, he labored zealously for some years in the ministry and in giving missions.

In 1865 he was appointed Master of Novices. To his novices he was ever a tender and loving father, giving them the example of every virtue. His life was practically a continual prayer. Rising very early every morning to be able to devote more time to it, he would spend hours in meditation before the Blessed Sacrament. Though very severe towards himself and addicted to corporal austerities, he, like a true saint, was always cheerful and full of charity and condescension towards others, and of solicitude in supplying the wants of his novices. His health failing, he was relieved of his heavy burden in 1870. From that time until his death, his life was one of continual suffering, borne with wonderful patience and resignation. As long as he was able he labored for his fellow-religious, and for the salvation of souls. Being an able spiritual director, he enabled his many penitents to make great progress in the spiritual life. As for himself he was an “interior man,” such as he describes in his “Meditations.” He died June 2, 1892, in the odor of sanctity.

Father Bronchain spent his years of suffering in composing spiritual works, which passed through many editions during his lifetime and have done incalculable good to souls. They are, like the works of St. Alphonsus, whose spirit he possessed in a remarkable degree, noted for the solidity of their doctrine, the simplicity and popularity of their language, and especially for that sweet unction which induces the practice of virtue, horror of sin, and especially the love of Jesus and Mary.

Index

by Date

by Subject

by Keyword

St. Damien of Molokai

Method

Servant of God

Links