{"id":31051,"date":"2015-04-15T07:49:46","date_gmt":"2015-04-15T11:49:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/?p=31051"},"modified":"2014-06-21T07:59:28","modified_gmt":"2014-06-21T11:59:28","slug":"blessed-cesar-de-bus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/2015\/04\/blessed-cesar-de-bus\/","title":{"rendered":"Blessed Cesar de Bus"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"blessed<\/a>Last year I heard about a French Blessed, a modern patron of catechists, Father Cesar de Bus, beatified in 1975 by Pope Paul VI. This same pope recommended to the Church this witness for our following.<\/em><\/p>\n

De Bus has an interest story for us to think about, and I think we in the USA ought\u00a0to\u00a0make the effort to allow his good name and missionary zeal flourish in our work of passing on the faith. \u00a0Connecting with de Bus in an real way is crucial for teaching the faith especially to children. We ought to invoke Blessed Cesar de Bus for those involved with the work of catechesis. A friend wrote, Father Ambrose, delivered the following homily on de Bus.<\/em><\/p>\n

“…saintly man named C\u00e9sar de Bus, who is a splendid patron and guide for all who seek to hand on the Catholic faith. He was born in Cavillon, France, on February 3, 1544, the seventh of thirteen children. Though he had a good Jesuit education, he was a worldly young man who couldn\u2019t decide between the career of a soldier and that of a writer. In the end, he decided for the military. It was the time of the bloody Wars of Religion in France, when it hung in the balance whether France would remain Catholic or become Protestant. And yet, despite fighting in the Catholic cause, C\u00e9sar himself led a life of dissipation: he was known as a party boy, as a dandy, as one who wanted to make his way at the royal court in Paris. He also still had literary ambitions.<\/p>\n

Now C\u00e9sar\u2019s brother was a priest, a cathedral canon with a good income. When his brother died, C\u00e9sar succeeded in gaining the income from his late brother\u2019s position without himself actually being a priest or doing anything in return for the income. It was an abuse that often happened in Catholic France in those days: a layman would hold a clerical position simply as a source of revenue. Just in case you don\u2019t know, the wasteful and worldly squandering of the Church\u2019s goods is not exactly a new problem. It was well-known and widely criticized in the 16th<\/sup> century, too.<\/p>\n

But then something unexpected happened. C\u00e9sar had come to know an illiterate but very pious servant girl named Antoinette Reveillade. This young woman had persuaded C\u00e9sar to read to her the lives of the saints, even while Antoinette fervently and in tears begged God that death would not find C\u00e9sar in mortal sin. He at first shrugged off her concern. Then, one night, as C\u00e9sar was on his way to a masked ball, he passed a shrine where a light burned before the image of Our Lady. Suddenly he remembered Antoinette, and was stricken with remorse and felt an overwhelming desire to repent and amend his life. He thought, \u201cHow can I recommend myself to God while I am on the way to offend Him?\u201d In the words of one of C\u00e9sar\u2019s biographers, \u201cOne tempestuous night, the All-powerful God, the King of Glory, encountered the worldly chevalier C\u00e9sar de Bus, obstinate in sin, and conquered him.\u201d There and then, like St. Paul on the road to Damascus, he was converted to Christ.<\/p>\n

C\u00e9sar resumed at last his studies for the priesthood and was ordained a priest at last in 1582 at the age of thirty-eight. He read the life of the Catholic Reformer St. Charles Borromeo and became convinced that widespread religious ignorance was the cause of many scandals and failures among French Catholics. But C\u00e9sar didn\u2019t just complain or wring his hands: he did something about it.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n

First, he converted his cousin Jean-Baptiste back to the Catholic faith. Jean-Baptiste had become a convinced Calvinist because of the impressive zeal and strictness shown by French Protestants, who so often put the Catholics to shame.\u00a0 After Jean-Baptiste returned to the Church, he, too, was ordained a priest. C\u00e9sar and his cousin then dedicated the rest of their lives to the work of catechesis, founding an order for that purpose called the Fathers of Christian Doctrine and also a similar order for women. After his conversion, Blessed C\u00e9sar directed his energies to two things: penance for his earlier life<\/strong> and the teaching of doctrine.<\/strong> And yet, it was actually an unlettered servant girl\u2019s prayers that had led to the grace of his conversion. This reminds us that it is only the love of God and of neighbor that can inspire the teaching of sound doctrine and make it fruitful in our lives<\/strong>. And yet, true charity cannot be content that those whom Christ has redeemed by his Most Precious Blood should be ignorant of divine truth. Ignorance is not <\/i>bliss, in religion or in anything else.<\/p>\n

Blessed C\u00e9sar died on 15 April 1607 and was beatified in 1975. At the beatification, Pope Paul VI (who will himself soon be beatified) had this to say about the parallels between our age and that of Blessed C\u00e9sar:<\/p>\n

[Our time] is a period in which the world is in crisis, as formerly, and in which most values, even the most sacred ones, are rashly questioned in the name of freedom, so that many people have no longer any point of reference, in a period in which danger comes certainly not from an excess of dogmatism but rather from the dissolution of doctrine and the nebulousness of thought\u2026 It seems to Us that an additional effort should be courageously undertaken to give the Christian people, who are waiting for it more than is thought, a solid, exact catechetical base, easy to remember<\/i>. We well understand that it is difficult today to adhere to the Faith, particularly for the young, a prey to so many uncertainties. They have the right at least to know precisely the message of Revelation, which is not the fruit of research, and to be the witnesses of a Church that lives by it<\/i>.<\/p>\n

C\u00e9sar de Bus had seen how religious divisions and social upheaval had devastated the faith of many. Amid all the fighting about religion between Catholics and Protestants\u2014and among<\/i> French Catholics, too\u2014, there was considerable neglect of the actual practice<\/i> of the faith.<\/p>\n

Surely, with the Venerable Servant of God Paul VI, we can see the parallels with the state of the Catholic Church after the Second Vatican Council. As in the 16th\u00a0century, there are the vast multitudes of Catholics, here and in Latin America, who have become Protestants because of our weakness in catechesis and evangelization. Is it any wonder that so many Catholics respond to the evangelical preachers who still have the courage to proclaim without dilution that Christ alone is the Way, the Truth, and the Life?\u00a0 Blessed C\u00e9sar saw these very failings among Catholics in France four hundred years ago.<\/p>\n

And, like that great saint, we can do something about the situation<\/i>. Think of that amazing story of Blessed C\u00e9sar\u2019s conversion and ask his intercession for a renewed zeal for the teaching of sound doctrine in our pulpits, our schools, and our catechetical programs.<\/p>\n

In the words of the Letter to the Hebrews, let us \u201clift up our drooping hands and strengthen our weak knees\u201d (Heb 12.12), for the Lord himself is calling us to work in his vineyard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last year I heard about a French Blessed, a modern patron of catechists, Father Cesar de Bus, beatified in 1975 by Pope Paul VI. This same pope recommended to the Church this witness for our following. De Bus has an interest story for us to think about, and I think we in the USA ought\u00a0to\u00a0make … Continue reading Blessed Cesar de Bus<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3022,32009,32010],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31051"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31051"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31053,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31051\/revisions\/31053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}