My dear Brothers and Sisters,
I am very pleased to be among you, the residents of Saint Peter’s, and to thank Sister Marie Claire and Mrs Fasky for their kind words of welcome on your behalf. I am also pleased to greet Archbishop Smith of Southwark, as well as the Little Sisters of the Poor and the personnel and volunteers who look after you.
As advances in medicine and other factors lead to increased longevity, it is important to recognize the presence of growing numbers of older people as a blessing for society. Every generation can learn from the experience and wisdom of the generation that preceded it. Indeed the provision of care for the elderly should be considered not so much an act of generosity as the repayment of a debt of gratitude.
During the brutally hot summer of 2003, thousands of French vacationers remained on holiday rather than returning home to bury their recently deceased parents, who had died from the extraordinary heat and were being stashed in air-conditioned storage lockers. Those acts of filial impiety cast into sharp relief the October canonization of Jeanne Jugan, foundress of the Little Sisters of the Poor.
Born during the virulently anti-Catholic French Revolution, Jeanne Jugan learned early in her life that fidelity to Christ and his Church could be costly. A history of the period of her childhood sums things up neatly: “In spite of the persecution, the people of Cancale kept the faith. During dark nights, in an attic or a barn, or even in the middle of the countryside, the faithful gathered together, and there in the silence of the night, the priest would offer the Eucharist and baptize the children. But this happiness was rare. There were so many dangers.”
To provide for the needs of the aged poor, Saint Jeanne Jugan walked the roads of Brittany seeking alms. Knocking on doors, she asked for money and gifts in kind—whatever was needed for her poor. She was recognized by the begging basket she carried.
He Hospitaller Brothers of Saint John of God had introduced Jeanne to the practice of the begging and given her her first basket. Like them, her vision of family extended far beyond those with whom she shared her life.
She believed that because God is our Father, all men and women are brothers and sisters—members of one family—and thus responsible for one another. She sought to involve people from many walks of life in her mission of hospitality, gratefully accepting whatever they could contribute in time, treasure or talent.
By our promise of hospitality we promise God to consecrate ourselves exclusively to the service of the elderly poor. We welcome them into our homes, form one family with them, accompany them from day to day and care for them with love and respect until God calls them home.
Through our promise of hospitality the Church has given us a mandate to prolong Christ’s mission of charity—to convey to the elderly, in the concrete realities of everyday life, the kindness and love of God for them, his eldest children.
