Saint Charles de Foucauld: His Life and Spirituality

Perhaps the most accessible introduction in English to Saint Charles, Sister Cathy’s beautifully illustrated book provides a clear and astute account of his life and times, as well as guided meditations that invite the reader to imitate the saint. One finishes the book with a deeper understanding of how we are to ‘preach with our lives.’ Highly recommended.

—Bonnie Thurston, author of Hidden in God: Discovering the Desert Vision of Charles de Foucauld

In her wonderfully readable study, Cathy Wright offers readers an empathetic and fresh picture of the complex, compelling journey of Charles de Foucauld: Viscount, adventure seeker, God-besotted lover, and uncompromising disciple whose immersion in the depth of divine love discovered in Jesus of Nazareth led him into often wild uncharted territories, both geographical and spiritual. A series of artfully guided meditations cap off the narrative and allow readers to explore Brother Charles’ unique spiritual insights and nurture their own journeys.

—Wendy M. Wright, Professor Emerita of Theology, Creighton University

In the simple and unpretentious voice of the Little Sisters of Jesus to which she belongs, Cathy Wright tells of the life and spirit of the saint who abandoned himself into the hands of the God present among the last, the lost, the little, and the least. In a divided and worn-torn world not unlike our own, de Foucauld’s ordinary, indeed mundane, holiness patterned on the hiddenness of Jesus at Nazareth is altogether resonant with the keynotes of Pope Francis’ call to missionary discipleship: presence, encounter, humility, accompaniment, mercy.

—Michael Downey, Theologian; North American Editor, Spirituality

SAINT CHARLES DE FOUCAULD

HIS LIFE AND SPIRITUALITY

BY CATHY WRIGHT, LSJ

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021950596

CIP data is available.

ISBN 10: 0-8198-9132-0

ISBN 13: 978-0-8198-9132-7

ISBN 13 (ePub): 978-0-8198-9133-4

Expanded from original edition, Charles de Foucauld: Journey of the Spirit, Pauline Books & Media, 2005.

Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible, Revised Edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970, Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C., and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All rights reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Excerpts from papal and magisterium texts copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Cittá del Vaticano. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

Permissions information is on page 169.

Cover design by Ryan McQuade

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

P and PAULINE are registered trademarks of the Daughters of St. Paul.

Copyright © 2022, Sr. Cathy Wright, lsj

Published by Pauline Books & Media, 50 Saint Pauls Avenue, Boston, MA 02130–3491

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Pauline Books & Media is the publishing house of the Daughters of St. Paul, an international congregation of women religious serving the Church with the communications media.

Contents

Foreword

General Introduction

PART ONE

Understanding the Mind and Heart of Charles de Foucauld

Introduction

Early Years: A Time of Tears and Confusion

From Playboy to Explorer

Questions and Conversion: Seeking the Face of God

The Discovery and Call to Nazareth

Life as a Trappist Monk: Still Searching for Nazareth

Hermit in the Holy Land and the Decision for Priesthood

Beni Abbès, Algeria

The Call of the Hoggar

Nazareth in Tamanrasset

The Visitation

Tamanrasset

Imitation of Jesus and Presence to the Muslim World

The Final Years

PART TWO

Praying with Charles de Foucauld

Introduction

1 Finding a Home in Jesus

2 Receive the Gospel

3 The Presence of Jesus

4 The Restless Heart—Called to Nazareth

5 The Visitation

6 Into Your Hands . . .

Epilogue

Miracles Obtained Through the Intercession of Saint Charles de Foucauld

Acknowledgments

Appendix

Letter to Henry de Castries

Bibliography

Foreword

The heart of Christian life is ultimately not a matter of believing certain doctrines about Jesus but endeavoring to follow him. Many of the great saints in history devised new ways of doing this, inspired by his example of poverty, obedience to the Father’s will, mercy, and charity. Yet, aside from the circumstances of his birth, our knowledge of Jesus’ example is generally determined by the period of his public ministry, as recorded in the Gospels. But this was only the final chapter, so to speak, of his life. What of the many hidden years before his baptism at the Jordan?

For Charles de Foucauld, these years when the Son of God lived quietly among his neighbors in Nazareth, were the workshop in which the mystery of the Incarnation and its message for Christian disciples originally took root. This insight came to him while on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. He was overcome by the thought that Christ had spent so many years in his hometown, fully embodying God’s love while working as a carpenter and living among his poor neighbors. At a later stage, Charles attempted to replicate this life in a literal fashion, actually living in Nazareth and working as a janitor for a community of Poor Clare nuns.

But eventually, he decided to take this mission public. Nazareth, after all, could actually be anywhere. With this understanding, he set out to implement a new model of religious life and mission by living as a contemplative amidst his poor neighbors in North Africa. He was drawn there by his early experience as a French officer, when his encounter with Muslim piety had played a great role in reawakening his own dormant faith. He was determined to proclaim the Gospel from the rooftops—not with words, he said, but by the way he lived.

So Brother Charles lived and died in the desert of North Africa, waiting for followers who never arrived. But the power and attraction of his spirituality eventually spread, inspiring communities like the Little Sisters of Jesus, to which the author of this book belongs. They have taken Brother Charles’ insight about Nazareth to the far corners of the world. But in fact his spirituality can speak to all Christians.

All situations—even a global pandemic—can be our Nazareth. What would it mean to carry and reflect the love of God and charity for our neighbors in the ordinary setting of our daily lives? It is no wonder that Pope Francis ended his encyclical Fratelli Tutti (On Fraternity and Social Friendship, no. 287), with a reflection on Charles de Foucauld, who wanted to be, in the end ‘the universal brother.’ As the Pope noted, it was only by identifying with the least did he come at last to be a brother of all. May God inspire that dream in each one of us.

Charles de Foucauld, the universal brother, died over a hundred years ago, in obscurity, and apparent failure. Yet many have regarded him as one of the great spiritual masters of modern times. Through his witness, countless people have rediscovered the face of Jesus in their neighbors and among those who are poor. And now that he has been named a saint, perhaps his message will be heard and heeded more widely.

In this invaluable guide to his life and his spiritual lessons, little sister Cathy Wright has penetrated the heart of his timely message. More than ever, the world has need of his compassionate spirit.

Robert Ellsberg

Robert Ellsberg is the publisher of Orbis Books. He has edited many volumes of the writings of Dorothy Day and written numerous books on saints and holiness. He is the editor of Charles de Foucauld: Essential Writings.

General Introduction

Some years ago I was asked to share about the life of Brother Charles de Foucauld with a group of priests. At the end, one of them said something to the effect of, That’s all very interesting, but what does it have to do with us today? It’s a fair question. From several points of view Charles de Foucauld is a complicated figure, and he could easily be dismissed because of his association with French colonial power in Algeria in the early 1900s.

As I have read and tried to write about Charles’ life, I have found different layers of answers to that question, each of which may appeal to different people.

On one level, Brother Charles was a marabout, someone whom everyone—Christian and Muslim alike—recognized as a man of God, not because they watched him praying for long hours of the day and night, but because they witnessed the fruit of that prayer: his down-to-earth goodness, his kindness, his openness to others, his joy. They sensed that he looked at them with love—a love that he had experienced in Jesus, a love that he knew Jesus had for them, too.

He was far from being a plaster saint. As most of us do, he struggled with faith and prayer and life—a fellow traveler along the journey. This encourages me to see that, through his faithfulness to his relationship with God and to the journey, he became more human as he became more holy, more settled, and at peace with himself and the world around him. Fortunately, that peace did not depend upon some elusive image of success, which he never found.

Brother Charles’ experience of Jesus and his reading of the Gospel continually took him beyond his preconceived ideas. He called on the Spirit of God, asking to be led in the ways of the Gospel. Among other things, he moved from an idealized conception of giving his life to God through radical, personal poverty, to understanding what it meant to give his life by concretely standing with and sharing the life of the poor, the life of a particular people, as Jesus had done in Nazareth. Pope Francis mentions Charles in the recent Encyclical Fratelli Tutti, calling him, as many do, the Universal Brother. It’s a phrase that Charles de Foucauld used of himself, wanting to be that brother who was truly there for each one he met.

In Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis writes about another important aspect of Brother Charles’ spirituality, the culture of encounter: Isolation and withdrawal into one’s own interests are never the way to restore hope and bring about renewal. Rather, it is closeness; it is the culture of encounter (Fratelli Tutti, no. 30). Charles discovered that when one dares to draw near to the other, to live in actual proximity with the other, and to allow friendship to grow, the presence of God reveals itself. It is a presence that transforms. We are in desperate need of pathways to hope amid the shadows of the violence, division, and racism that grip our world. Charles’ respect for the other, for the person right in front of him however different in background and point of view, has a message for us. He wasn’t perfect, but he was a man who was open to growth, and this was a saving grace.

Another timely intersection of Brother Charles’ life is with the world of Islam in which he immersed himself. It was the sight of Muslims at prayer which began to reveal his own hunger for faith and a way to make sense of the world and his place in it. He welcomed this and allowed it to lead him until he eventually discovered through