20 years - “Heart’s Home, a small seed story”

Homily de­liv­ered by Rev. Thierry de Roucy, on the 20^th Anniversary of Heart’s Home’s Intuition Day - New York, January 4, 2010

It was a Thursday, on January 4^th. This day was to be like any other day. I was at the monastery of Ourscamp, the moth­er house of the Congregation I used to be­long to. In the morn­ing I had been busy writ­ing new year cards and an­swer­ing many phone calls. Probably the lunch with the com­mu­ni­ty was still af­fect­ed by some kind of post-Christmas peace and  joy. Once the meal was over, we got our coats on and went out to pray the Rosary, walk­ing in the park. While our pro­ces­sion passed by the ru­ins of the old abbey, we were pray­ing the first joy­ful mys­tery, the Annunciation. Suddenly, as in a flash, I was given the grace to be­hold the Movement as it ex­ists to­day. No ex­ta­sis, no earthquake, no apoc­a­lyp­tic vi­sion… Only a breath, a very sweet light… No words, but a si­lence full of a Presence…

It hap­pened in such a way that none of my fel­low broth­ers, who were pray­ing by my side, could ev­er have guessed any­thing spe­cial had hap­pened. Apparently noth­ing ex­traor­di­nary had hap­pened, yet this min­ute would turn my life up­side down, and after me, the lives of so many…

Later that day, in the si­lence of my room, I felt the same as ev­er… and yet to­tal­ly dif­fer­ent; as if I was the keep­er of an in­cred­i­ble se­cret. God had just burst in­to my life, as he did when I heard him for the first time, call­ing me to con­se­crat­ed life. I was not that wor­ried about « How it would hap­pen ». God, who was call­ing me cer­tain­ly had plans about how this call would be­come flesh. I was humbly of­fer­ing my­self. I just trust­ed.

From that day on, the monastery was like Nazareth to me. This event was to be un­der­stood in the light of the Annunciation. A mod­est place. Grace vis­it­ing me in such a hid­den way. A poor hu­man be­ing, both sur­prised by this en­coun­ter and pre­pared to it, wait­ing to see what would hap­pen. Called to play a part in the Mystery of Redemption. His trust­ing, self-of­fer­ing in the hands of God. A sweet and pro­found hap­pi­ness…

This call is not to be con­fused with a kind of au­thor­i­ta­tive com­mand­ment: « Y­ou have to do this ! You have to do that ! » It is not about a com­mand­ment, it is about a gift, it is about the new­ness of a Presence; it is about a small seed that had – and still has – to grow, pro­vid­ed our free­dom does not im­peed Grace from wa­ter­ing it down… It is about a Word of Life re­spect­ful­ly seed­ed in a hu­man heart. A very moth­er­ly word, a word like Mary’s words, a word which I im­me­di­ate­ly re­ceived as a word of com­fort and com­pas­sion.

Once again, God want­ed to man­i­fest His love to the lowli­est of His broth­ers and sis­ters, to those who suf­fer, those who are lone­ly. Once again, he want­ed to do so through our poor hu­man­i­ty, our clum­sy words, and - more deeply - through the gift of our lives. He want­ed to say: “I am here! Do not be afraid!”. He want­ed to say: “Your suf­fer­ing is not to be an ob­sta­cle to my pres­ence. Your lone­li­ness is not an ob­sta­cle to my com­pa­ny. It is rather the manger in whose shad­ow I lie. With you I live. With you I hope…”

20 years! Since that January 4^th of 1990, this word has been spread all over the world, this Presence has em­braced so many peo­ple, the seed has grown up in­to a beau­ti­ful tree. Our sin cer­tain­ly has lim­it­ed the growth of Heart’s Home, but God, in his Mercy, did not al­low it to dis­ap­pear. On the con­trary, he sup­port­ed its growth. The Immaculate, Mother and Queen of our hum­ble fam­i­ly, has al­ways been such an in­cred­i­ble and deeply mov­ing com­pa­ny all through­out our his­to­ry. She has kept look­ing after us, walk­ing ahead of us, walk­ing at our side… She has al­ways been there to fix what we had bro­ken, to com­pen­sate for our lack of ten­der­ness, to com­plete what­ev­er we had left un­fin­ished. We are im­mense­ly grate­ful to her…

Today, the work ahead of us is not less than that of 20 years ago. It seems that hu­man­i­ty is sink­ing more and more in­to a deep­er Passion. It’s our task and re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to re­spond to that suf­fer­ing with a more in­tense com­pas­sion!

May the Lord grant the mem­bers of Heart’s Home eyes to see, a heart to un­der­stand, feet to run to­ward those in need! May He grant us to be true Epiphanies of his lov­ing Presence, for the com­fort and joy of many!

Heart’s Home’s his­to­ry, a few mile­stones…