WORDS OF POPE PIUS X
Pius X, in an audience granted in 1908 to Msgr. Cloutier, Bishop of Three Rivers, Canada, addressed the following words to the Bishop, who was laying before His Holiness his many projects for the good of his diocese:
“And now, my dear Son, if you desire that God should bless your apostolate and make it fruitful, undertake everything for His glory, saturate yourself and your devoted fellow-workers with the spirit of Jesus Christ, animating yourself and them with an intense interior lift. To this end, I can offer you no better guide than ‘The Soul of the Apostolate,’ by Dom Chautard, Cistercian Abbot. I warmly recommend this book to you, as I value it very highly, and have myself made it my bedside book.”
AUTOGRAPH LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS POPE BENEDICT XV
To Dom J. B. Chautard, Abbot of the Trappist Monastery of Notre Dame de Sept-Fons, upon the receipt of his work entitled “L’Ame de Tout Apostolat.”
Dearly Beloved Son:
We congratulate you sincerely upon having brought out so clearly the absolute necessity of the interior life for those engaged in good works, a life so necessary for the success of their ministry.
Expressing a wish that this work in which are found gathered together doctrinal lessons and practical advice suited to the needs of our times may continue to spend and do good.
We send with all Our heart to its esteemed author an affectionate Apostolic Blessing.
Given at the Vatican, March 18, 1915.
BENEDICT PP XV
OTHER TESTIMONIALS
His Eminence Cardinal VICO
sent, along with the letter of the Sovereign Pontiff, the following lines:
I hasten to send you herewith the Parchment that our Holy Father, Pope BENEDICT XV, had kindly entrusted to me to transmit to you.
You will read in this revered autograph letter the great praise that His Holiness gives to your valuable book L’Ame de Tout Apostolat. The Holy Father has read this book with deep satisfaction.
Already PIUS X of holy memory had entrusted me with the care of expressing his warm congratulations to the pious prelate who translated your book into Spanish.
From
His Eminence Cardinal SEVIN,
Your book is a golden book. I have read it eagerly. Never has Pius X met with a commentator more pious, more learned, more eloquent, more practical on the thoughts with which he has filled his Exhortation to the Clergy and twenty other Encyclicals.
You may be sure that I have made this treasure known around me. Your book is used in the spiritual readings of both my seminaries. To Bishops and to a number of priests I have expressed a sincere admiration for your work.
From
His Eminence Cardinal MERCIER,
Archbishop of Mechlin
The events in which I have just taken part did not allow me sufficient freedom of mind and the leisure that I should have had to read your book with the attention which it deserves and to fix my mind on the sublime thoughts that you have set forth with your apostolic ardour.
On looking over your book, I have been struck by the resemblance of your teaching with the main subject of a retreat that I preached in 1910 to the clergy of my diocese.
From
His Eminence Cardinal VIVES,
It is no small merit to have been able in your excellent work on the interior life and the Apostolate to condense doctrine and practical methods. . . .
From
His Eminence Cardinal FISCHER, Archbishop of Cologne
I fully approve of what you have written with so much learning, so much experience in this matter and so much unction.
From
His Eminence Cardinal AMETTE, Archbishop of Paris
I read with much edification your book: L’Ame de Tout Apostolat, and I will be happy to recommend it to our priests and to zealous persons who devote themselves to good works. In Paris, especially, where the exterior work of the apostolate is so absorbing, it is of great importance to be always animated by that sap of the interior life which can alone assure its fecundity.
From
His Eminence Cardinal LUCON, Archbishop of Reims
I appreciate the truth of the thesis which you develop and completely approve of it. . . .
From
His Eminence Cardinal ARCOVERDE, Archbishop of Rio de Janeiro
To put on Jesus Christ, to live the life of Jesus Christ, is the soul of every apostolate as you say in your excellent book. . . .
From
His Excellency D. PENON, Bishop of Moulins
Fresh and profound thoughts, impressive comments on several well known texts and on new texts taken from Holy Scripture and the Fathers, striking examples, most of them collected and vouched for by yourself in the good works with which you have been intimately connected, in fine and above all, the personal note, with which you show forth the fecundity of an apostolate, which results from the union of zeal and piety by the Eucharistic and liturgical life, add a more powerful attraction and assure a fuller efficacy to what you have already said so well in the first development of your fundamental thesis.
Priests, religious, both men and women, lay people interested in the apostolate, will have no pretext for doing without this vade mecum. Zealous souls especially may distribute it widely so that it may be for everyone’s use, not for reading once only, but habitually, so that they may go back to it, employ it for meditation, that it may serve for annual and monthly retreats and also for the training of seminarists or novices. . . .
From
His Excellency DR. MARRE,
Titular Bishop of Const., Abbot General of the Reformed Cistercians
Nothing has pleased me more than to hear about the new edition of your excellent book, “L’Ame de Tout Apostolat.”
