The mother of the holy priest
Among the witnesses and people who approached Jean-Marie Vianney, how can we not mention his mother! A realistic and practical woman, Marie Béluse, daughter of Pierre Béluse and Marguerite Tabard, was born in 1753; she married Mathieu Vianney on February 11, 1772 in Écully. Living in Dardilly (north of Lyon) where Mathieu is a farmer, they will have 6 children, the 4th of whom will be Jean-Marie.
Jean-Marie Vianney received a lot from his mother and he was very grateful. He frequently remarked that one could never be grateful enough for the benefits received from a Christian mother “virtue passes so well from the hearts of mothers to those of children…”.
The good God
She gave him the sense of God, of life with God. She is the first to teach him to pray, to know God and to love him. She will teach him to live under his gaze, that is to say in all truth, in all simplicity with Him. This quality will guide him throughout his life, in the most difficult moments when he does not perceive the will of God, as well as in the more peaceful periods. His familiarity with the “Good God” which will surprise those close to him so much, certainly comes from this habit acquired from childhood. From this intimacy is born the authenticity of a Christian life.
Marie Béluse had taught him to turn to God when the clock on the Dardilly farm struck the hours, and thus to entrust his occupations, his joys or his sorrows to Jesus. One of the first things he will do when he arrives in Ars will be to raise the bell tower and install a clock there; he will thus be able to invite his parishioners, when the bells ring, to turn their hearts to the Lord.
He will be so marked by the example of his Mother, that one of the reasons for the creation of the house of Providence will be for the Holy Curé, to “train Mothers”. He thought that the best way to win the hearts of his parishioners and turn them towards God was through mothers; his work of evangelization will go through this.
She knew…
His mother had sensed, as is often the case for mothers, the extent of God’s call on his children and especially on his Jean-Marie. As a child, she said to him one day: “you see Jean-Marie, if your brothers and sisters sinned (in the sense of seriously) it would pain me, but especially if it was you.” When he tells her, already grown up, of his desire to become a priest, she will answer him: “you know, I’ve known that for a long time”.
She therefore carried and accompanied her son’s vocation, even if she left too soon to see him as a priest. Having become a pastor of souls, he will often sense the depth of God’s call on those who came to him and he will help them to respond with all their heart to this call. The “charisma” of the mother engendered and carried that of the priest. She died on February 8, 1811; “Since I lost her I have no longer been attached to anyone on earth” remarked her saintly son….
Extract from the Annales d’Ars n° 334[septembre-octobre 2011] .
