Honouring the work of St Vincent de Paul Society
Recently I celebrated a Mass at the Church of the Apostles, Launceston, to mark 125 years since the foundation of the first conference of the St Vincent de Paul Society in Tasmania, which was in the Launceston Parish.
The Society was founded in Paris by a young law student at the Sorbonne, Frederic Ozanam, in 1833. Frederic was a committed Catholic and active among student groups at the university and during a lively debate with fellow students he was challenged: “What is your church doing now? What is She doing for the poor of Paris? Show us your works and we will believe you”.
The young university student decided to respond to this challenge. With a small group of his fellow students he began visiting the homes of the poor, identifying their needs and providing practical assistance.
From this small group of young people an organisation grew in Frederic’s lifetime to have 2,000 members and now has over 800,000 members in over 150 countries worldwide.
Young Frederic Ozanam was assisted in this work by a Daughter of Charity, Sr Rosalie Rendu. No doubt this extraordinary religious who was busy meeting the needs of those suffering from an outbreak of cholera in Paris, inspired young Ozanam to name his charitable organisation in honour of the founder of the Daughters of Charity and the great apostle of charity, the 17th century priest, Vincent de Paul.
In recognising the work of the St Vincent de Paul Society particularly in local parish conferences, we look to the saint in whose name the Society functions today. It is hard to summarise the diverse works of the priest – as a young priest he organised wealthy women to care for the needs of the poor; he founded a religious order of priests, the Vincentians, with St Louise de Marillac he founded the Daughters of Charity, he conducted parish missions and In the last 25 years of his life, he took an interest in beginning seminaries. He founded 20!
In one homily he said, “Let us ask God to give the Company this spirit, this heart, this heart that causes us to go everywhere, this heart of the Son of God, the heart of Our Lord, the heart of Our Lord, the heart of Our Lord, that disposes us to go as He went… He sends us, like the apostles, to bring fire everywhere, to bring this divine fire, this fire of love”.
St Vincent de Paul himself was clearly burning with a divine fire which enabled his extraordinary work to be so diverse and so fruitful.
He said on another occasion, “Loving someone is wanting all that is good for that person. Loving the Lord then is wanting that this name be known and manifested over the whole world, that his kingdom come, and his will be done on earth as it is it in heaven”.
The work of the St Vincent de Paul Society is a clear expression of the call of Christ to make love of neighbour a true manifestation of being his disciples. The life and works of St Vincent de Paul are testimony to what is possible when a heart burns with the fire of love.