One Woman's Life, Many Women's Stories
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One Woman’s Life - Many Women’s Stories… Compiled by Mary Campion McCarren FCJ Dedication For all the women who have so generously allowed their stories to be used and for all women everywhere whose lives are marked by courage, love and service. Introduction It is so easy to think of foundresses of religious orders as long ago people, people somehow different from ourselves.Their true selves have, over the years, become shrouded in myth and legend; they seem frozen in snapshot, offering only set pieces to our gaze. But a simple re-telling of the story of Marie Madeleine Victoire reveals a real flesh and blood woman who lived and loved, laughed and cried, knew suffering and pain, felt herself called to reach out to others and to stay with them in their need. By interleaving her story with the stories of contemporary women, we see more clearly that, although born in Châteauroux, France, 21 September 1781,Victoire is surprisingly modern, sister ‘under the skin’ to women from around the world in the twenty-first century.Wife and widow, mother and daughter, single parent, struggler for justice, challenge to the status quo, loyal opposition of church authorities, believing in herself and in her conscience, secure in her God; in honouring the stories of women from around the world, women of different race, creed and background, we honour too their common sisterhood and rejoice in the giftedness they share with Marie Madeleine. And here is love like a tinsmith’s scoop sunk past its gleam in the meal-bin. (Seamus Heaney) Her family The extended de Bengy family into which Marie Madeleine Victoire was born was a large one. In addition to her immediate family she was surrounded by aunts, uncles and cousins.They were a happy, secure family, long established in Berry, France, where various members held distinguished positions in both church and kingdom.Then with the onset of the Revolution they knew hardship, prison and exile. Gigi, as she was known as a child, was close to her parents.When she was one year old, her two- year old brother, Etienne, died and we can only imagine how doubly precious she was to her bereaved parents. She was nearly three when Claude was born, six when Angèle arrived and fourteen at the time of Philippe’s birth.To him, she was always a second mother. She was his godmother and all his life he was aware of how she had tended and guided him. Madame de Bengy was a wise and loving mother who showed herself courageous and persevering when her husband was imprisoned during the Revolution. She did not buckle under adversity, did not allow herself to give way to despair when faced with hardship and trouble. She divided her energies between working for her husband’s release and bringing up their children in a secluded farmhouse to face their changed circumstances.Victoire she trained in the arts of housekeeping and homemaking but it was the example of her fidelity to prayer and her trust in God which remained with Victoire to the end of her life. Victoire loved her mother, but it would seem that her father was the centre of her young life. When Madame de Bengy gathered her children to pray for their father’s release,Victoire tells us that her secret prayer was that she might be imprisoned and die with him! Her wish was not granted! Once her father was released the family moved from Châteauroux to Issoudun and the eighteen-year old, no longer ‘Gigi’ but ‘Mademoiselle Victoire’ embarked on the next stage of her life’s journey. She became friends with a girl about her own age, Constance de Rochfort.The two were inseparable, enjoying long conversations together pouring out their troubles and pleasures to each other.Together they went round the town, visiting people who were sick, helping people in need and volunteering their services at the local Hospice. Like any teenager fired with a sense of justice,Victoire was indignant to learn that those allegedly serving the sick at St Roch’s Hospice were taking for themselves the food and wine meant for the patients. Even when she was a child, her family had been well aware of her determination, even stubbornness, and so no-one was surprised when she reported the abuses to the authorities and persevered with her case until things were put right. According to the custom of the time,Victoire’s father chose her bridegroom, Joseph de Bonnault d’Houët.Although it was decided upon by their parents, it was a marriage into which both Victoire and Joseph entered freely and gladly. Constance was well aware her friendship with Victoire would necessarily change and she knew too that Victoire did not see the matter as she did! ‘I do not want to give up the joy of intimate talks with you simply because you have a husband. I have had a grudge against him for a long time, because he is the cause of our separation.What grieves me is that I am very much afraid that you do not share my feelings!’ Victoire and her mother planned eagerly for the wedding.They made lists and embarked on shopping expeditions, choosing materials and patterns for the ‘trousseau’. Silk, wool and worsted all figure in their letters,‘Mademoiselle Janette’ was entrusted with the making of underclothes and ‘six morning jackets of the finest cotton.’ There was general rejoicing over the marriage which took place in the vast Cathedral at Bourges, 21 August 1804. Her cousin, Claude, who married only three weeks before she did, wrote celebratory verses for the occasion. Joseph and Victoire made an attractive couple as they took their place in the social life of Bourges where both their families were well known.They were happy too in their own home where they read together and prayed together; as Victoire and Constance had done, they visited the sick but Joseph also visited prisoners of war held in the city, providing food and comforts for them. He believed, as did his father-in-law, that ‘the greatest riches one can have are the esteem and regard of one’s fellow citizens; to merit it one must make oneself useful.’ On one of these expeditions Joseph caught typhoid fever. For six months he was desperately ill and, despite Victoire’s tender care, died less than a year after their marriage. His funeral with solemn Requiem took place in the Cathedral where they had married.The young widow was desolate and relied heavily on the care and companionship of her sister and sister-in-law. Her only son, Eugène When she married Joseph, her father gave her the long low manor house at Parassy as her dowry. Surrounded by meadows, farmland and vines it was an idyllic spot. Joseph and herself went there the day after their marriage and now within two weeks of his death she went back, seeking to come to terms there with her loss. But grief was a luxury she could not allow herself for already she was almost eight months pregnant. For her baby’s birth it was seen as imperative that she return to the de Bonnault family home. Joseph’s son and heir, Eugène, was born in Bourges, 23 September1805. Despite the loving care of her ‘double family’Victoire suffered postnatal depression. She suffered from anxieties which made her fear the sleeping child was dead, from fears which made her have someone stand at the window to wave to her as she returned home, assuring her that all was well, and from nightmares in which she saw her own funeral. But gradually she recovered her equilibrium and again enjoyed parties, balls and theatres.Again she turned to the works she had undertaken with her husband and made such good use of her wealth that a murderer on trial in Châteauroux was quoted as having said there were three rich people in the town and two were to be killed - but not Madame de Bonnault.‘She’, he insisted, with a note of approval, ‘puts her money to too good use’! Joseph had told her,‘If God gives us a daughter, train her as your mother trained you’ and now she guarded jealously the formation of her son.Always aware of his loss she was unwilling to discipline him too firmly with the result that her mother-in-law threatened to intervene. Such a threat galvanised Victoire into action! As she looked at Eugène, who according to his grandfather grew very like his father, she would have been so aware of what Joseph had missed in not seeing his son grow up and later in not knowing his grandsons.The interest with which she watched over them all as they advanced in their chosen professions, must always have reminded her that it was a joy Joseph had not shared. Cousin Claude was nearby. His wife, Anne-Augustine, only a year younger than her new cousin, formed a close relationship with her.Their first child, Armande, was a year younger than Eugène and all her life she remembered the two young mothers delighting together at the antics of their children. ‘No more but e’en a woman…’ (Shakespeare) Wives and Mothers We said earlier that though destined ultimately to found a religious Order,Victoire was first a wife and mother, sharing the experiences and emotions of others. As she went to Bourges Cathedral for her wedding, she was no different from many another bride in her hopes and dreams. Jane, reflecting on her wedding day, is aware that though she speaks what seem like clichés about ‘wanting to spend the rest of our lives together’ and ‘embarking on a journey together’, everyone who gets married must have some feelings in common… ‘I know I felt absolutely, calmly SURE that I was doing the right thing… that Paolo was a good man, and that we were good for each other, brought out the best in each other.