The Desert and the Rose 사막과 장미

         (written in 2005)

I recently read an inspiring book entitled "The Desert and the Rose", which depicts the spiritual development of Jeanne Jugan(1792-1879). I'm happy this book has recently been translated into Korean and published.

 Have you heard of the story of the seafarer's daughter from Cancale, a small fishing port in western France? Jeanne Jugan, founder of "the Little Sisters of the Poor," was born in 1792 in Cancale. Her father was lost at sea when she was four.

 She turned down a marriage proposal because she believed that God wanted her for "a work as yet unknown." When she was forty-seven years old, she became concerned with elderly people and dedicated her life to them.

 She acted with womanly warm-hearted compassion. During the cold winter of 1839, she brought home a poor old woman who was paralyzed and blind. She gave the old woman her bedroom and slept in the attic alone. Thus, the community for the poor elderly began to flourish. The small charitable action was gradually turning into a religious community.

 Nevertheless, Jeanne Jugan was condemned to inaction, silence, and solitude for 27 years because of a power struggle involving the self-proclaimed Superior General Fr. Le Pailleur, who was the previous adviser to the community. She was 60 years old when she was asked to cease all transactions, collection, and contact with benefactors.

 In fact, she was elected Superior, but he annulled the election and put his spiritual daughter, Marie Jamet, in her place. From then on, Jeanne Jugan was considered a mere sister, relieved of authority and responsibility. Being unjustly removed from the leadership of the congregation, she was known as "Soeur Marie de la Croix(Sr. Mary of the Cross)."

 She was tall, determined, and alert with a decisive personality. She was ready to adapt to the most unpredictable situations. She was a traveler, an indefatigable collector, and a charismatic woman who worked for the solidarity of the poor and the elderly.

 At 81, she could no longer read or sew because she was nearly blind. So she spent her time praying and meditating. She said "I no longer see anything but God. He sees me, that is enough." "Be very little... only the little ones are pleasing to God." Making the poor happy was her goal in life.

 In 1879, at age 86, she died at La Tour Saint-Joseph. At that time, the Congregation consisted of 2,400 members. And in 1982, she has finally declared Blessed by Pope John Paul II.

 Her life story is a refreshing source of joy and hope for the aged. She continues to remind us that perfect joy comes from patience and suffering. She used to say to postulants and novices, "Be little, stay little! Keep the spirit of humility."

 Just imagine that you were once in charge of a certain position or a role but lost everything all of a sudden. Almost everybody would protest, blame others, or complain about the situation. Accepting the unjust reality is not an easy task. Furthermore, keeping silent, enjoying the present, and enduring to the end demand saintly courage.

 Jeanne Jugan obeyed without serious protest or resistance. She let herself be forgotten. Forgotten and excluded from the council, she may have suffered greatly but she was not shaken. Beyond the limits, she learned to present herself before God with open hands and a poor person's heart. Through trial and error, she became God's work of art.

 Biographer Eloi Leclerc concludes her story as follows: "Humanity's greatness, its true wealth, does not reside in what is visible. It lies in what is carried in the heart. That is what Jeanne's silence tells us. It also tells us that a person who has been condemned to oblivion can carry the whole world in her heart: a reconciled world, already penetrated by infinite tenderness.

 Today God, the founder of the world, also finds himself sidelined, forgotten at the door of all the councils where the business of the world is decided upon. He is not among the great. He is relegated to the shadows as useless and nonexistent. Jeanne's silence opens out into God's silence. That silence does not signify that God has deserted us and keeps his distance from our daily life on earth.

 On the contrary, it signifies that he has come so close to us that we can only hear him by listening to our own hearts. We need to lend an ear to the mystery that resides in us. God's silence in us is the silence of the source. It is always at dawn that one hears his love. At the time when no track yet runs through the dew, nothing distracts the eye, and man's heart opens up like the rose in the silence of the rising dawn."

 The Korea Times/ Thoughts of the Times/ Jan. 14, 2005