A few words from Pierre
on humility
Humility
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
To acquire humility, one must do acts of humility. And to do acts of humility, often there are humiliations. So our self-esteem takes a big hit. We have to start with tiny things!
Community Weekend 14-15/06/80
The humble one is the one who does not worry because he is a child; he knows that he has a Father, that he is almighty and that he loves him. So we are at ease!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
We can all work for the glory of God. So, we really have to start. But we are so proud, we are so stupid at this level that we only think of great things that would be worthy of people and then worthy of the Lord. But it is just the opposite!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
The essential thing is the Lord, the internal life, adoration and prayer. If we do not live in prayer, in adoration and in the humility and gentleness of the Lord’s Heart, everything else is useless.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 03/08/79
We understand that we must be humble; we understand that we can't do anything. If you don't understand, if you continue to rely on yourself a little bit, you're done, there's no mistake.
Inter-assembly Emmanuel Day 13/03/76
Our glory is the Lord’s gratuity. It is that we are poor people. And the more we are poor people, the more wonderful it is. Because it gives us humility, it humbles us, and it is only, as Silouane said, in humility that we receive the Holy Spirit. This is extraordinary, it is really the Holy Spirit… And Silouane spent his whole life asking for the Holy Spirit. And (let’s ask) since it is the only promise that is sure to be answered, it is the Lord who said it! But then, let’s try to have humility.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
It is the upright hearts and the humble (I don’t know how humble we are, but we have to try!) who understand the Kingdom of God. The others are so big, so powerful, so strong…
Pentecost Gathering for Unity in Lyon 28-30/05/77
(Jesus) speaks from His Heart which so loved men and He tells us: “The secret is: learn from Me – this is His teaching – that I am gentle and humble of Heart and you will find peace in your souls.” And if one day you were not at peace, you would say to yourself, “Am I really in the meekness of the mighty? Do I ask for this gentleness in prayer? Do I really ask the Lord to bring me his Spirit and to be gentle? To be gentle with the Love of Jesus?” Then we can’t do it ourselves, but with him we can. And then we will find peace, the peace that the Lord gives and not the peace that the world gives. So we repeat this all the time! […] So, Jesus, really, give us this secret!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
We really need to have great charity and great humility. It is the Lord who must give it to us. For that you have to ask it at the foot of the Tabernacle, at the Eucharist. We really feel it deeply.
French-speaking Africa Conference Paray le Monial 12-16/07/79
The essential thing is not to choose our road, but to take the road that the Lord indicates to us since He is “the Way, the Truth and the Life”. So, this is humility, this is really it. Humility is truth. To be in truth is to take the path that the Lord gives us […] and not always to think, in a Jansenist way, that the hardest road is the best. It is only the road that the Lord asks you to take: it is union with God.
Community Weekend 18-19/06/77
You do acts and by virtue of doing acts of humility, well, little by little, you will obtain humility. Then you will reach Heaven!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
The more humble you are,
the more intelligent you are.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
“I think the most extraordinary elevator is humility. So to [acquire] humility, you have to do acts of humility. And to do acts of humility, often there are humiliations. So our self-esteem takes a big hit. It’s a bit annoying! So we have to start with very small things. Because we are very sensitive on that side. I mean, I’m speaking for myself, of course, not for you.”
Community Weekend 14-15/06/80
The more Christ was humbled, the more we are humbled, the more we are in glory: we are really in the glory of the Lord. And if we really take it like that, then we are victorious, we are not defeated. You are only defeated when you want to be, and when you give in to defeat. If you don’t want to be defeated, you’re not defeated, because the Lord is there and He’s got you. He is Somebody!”
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
Don’t hesitate to call, make your act of humility! There are people who always want to help their neighbor, but they never want to be helped; they want to give a gift, they don’t want to receive. So it is very important to be a poor person and to say to your friend: “This is not good, you have to pull me up. And while he’s pulling you up, this [pulls him up himself].”
Interview on 23/05/76
Let's not be surprised when we fail. And let's even be happy to miss because we say to ourselves, "Well, that gives me a little humility!" So it's a success at that point!
Community Weekend 01/04/79
For all your problems, you ask Jesus and what does He answer you? He answers you, “Be gentle and humble of heart, do your best.”
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
You see, you must always be humble. Humility is not so easy!
Community Weekend 30-31/05/81
Jesus asks only for our good will and humility and faith. Let us simply believe him.
Preparatory notes for a teaching session summer 1980
Poverty
Our heart is not worth much; at least mine is. And we are not able to change it because we are poor. We are poor people, but if we ask the Lord to change our heart – it is possible for him alone – little by little, he transforms us, he changes us, he puts a very great amount of love in our heart.
Cycle of youth weekends 24-25/10/81
Therese of the Child Jesus came to teach us this way, a very simple way for small and weak people, as we are. We are the poor people of the Lord, in a very poor time
Weekend "Emmanuel" 25-26/10/75
The grace of adoration gives a grace of union and poverty.
We understand what true poverty is.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 25/06/77
The vocation of Emmanuel is “God with us”, I have told you this more than once. God with us, but he is small, he is very small.
So if we are big, we look ridiculous in relation to him
Emmanuel Inter-Assembly Day 13/03/76
Gathering in Vézelay 07/74
I asked God for forgiveness and boom! the Lord descended upon me, I don’t know what happened but I know that when I got up, I was not the same.
Interview by Jean-Romain Frisch 05/05/77
I said “good”. At that moment, I was taken… by a misery, by a view on my misery, terrible: a light that I received on my misery. So I said: “I cannot receive it, I absolutely must go to confession. He [Father Caffarel] said to me, “No, no, no problem.” But I said, “No, listen, I absolutely must go to confession.” I confessed and then he said to me, “Well no, in the end, we won’t do it now, we’ll do it later. I was very happy to have confessed, very happy about this misery and very happy to have seen this misery and to feel the Holy Spirit. I was so happy! I want what the Lord wants, I didn’t mind at all. So I went home and the next day I woke up in joy! “What am I doing waking up like this? Usually in the morning I always have my gallbladder working more or less, always blocked. So I said: “What’s wrong with me? And suddenly I became aware that the Holy Spirit was in me, in Person… simply, quietly.
Interview by Jean-Romain Frisch 05/05/77
I’ll tell you a little secret. When I was young…, I used to talk to my spiritual advisor and I would say to him, “Oh, I’m such a bad guy, such a bad guy, such a bad guy. And he would gently say to me: “Don’t say: I am a bad guy, say: I am a poor guy.” I said, “Ah, that’s it, that’s beautiful! So there you have it: now, well, I’m Jesus’ poor guy!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 29-30/07/80 Process of consecrations
The Lord always takes poor guys to help Him. That way, at least, He's sure that we won't be taken seriously and that He'll be the one to drop by... I say that for me!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 08/79 First teaching
Nothing can or should stop us, not even our sin, not even our poorness.
Interview with Pierre
The Lord doesn’t love us because we are clean. He loves us because He loves us… It is not at all because of our merits. We have nothing to do with it.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 30-31/12/77
These graces of poverty will be given to us in adoration. And our hearts will be inflamed, inflamed with love for the Lord and for our brothers. We will be like living torches, we will be able to set the world on fire, starting with France.
Meeting Fraternity of Jesus 25/06/77
If we adore, we really feel poorer and poorer, but we put ourselves entirely in the arms of Jesus. And we really ask him to open our hearts… And his Heart warms us, burns us. We burn with love and then we radiate. And as we burn with love, well, whether we are in prayer, or with the sick, or whatever, we are always burning with love and we see Jesus everywhere.
Meeting Fraternity of Jesus 25/06/77
Childlike spirit
Community Weekend 18-19/06/77
As the demon is very big, very bloated, the best way to expel it is to make ourselves very small because then it can no longer enter our homes
Emmanuel Inter-Assembly Day 13/03/76
We are little people. The Lord does not ask much of us. They [the ancients] offered themselves as a holocaust victim to divine justice. We offer ourselves to the merciful Love, that’s all. And Jesus is even more pleased. Because he says, “At least they have no self-love at all.”
Community Weekend 18-19/06/77
We know that God loves us, that his feelings do not vary, that he continues to love us in spite of our imperfections and even if we have made a joke. Well, so much the better, we come to be humbled and then He fixes it even better than if we had not sinned. So it’s really amazing with him, it gives us humility. The important thing is to be poor before him, really. And it’s always our self-esteem because we are not happy. But, when we have sinned, is it mainly because we have hurt Jesus that we feel sorry or because our self-love says to us: “Damn, I have sinned again! So in the end, it is always ourselves that we are seeking. […]
Let us simply ask the Lord to be small.
Community Weekend 01/04/79
Patience
I will give you a personal example. I was 19 years old (I converted at 19)… I had seen Thérèse of the Child Jesus, so I said: “Chic she is 24 years old, I still have 5 years to achieve success with her”. So I raced against the clock with Thérèse of the Child Jesus. You have understood that I was beaten, but really, at the finish line! I was out of breath though, I was really out of breath because I had gone too fast, it’s obvious . missed one Therese, I’ll succeed on the other.” Teresa of Avila, it was good because she took 20 years. So I said: “20 years! I will never take 20 years! To stay in a convent for 20 years and not move forward, really that’s charming!” And then I saw that it took me 40 years and I still hadn’t moved on. And then, at the moment when I said: “I will never make it, I will never finish it”, paf! it starts to work again. So you have every chance! The main thing is to really wait for the Lord to call you.
Community Weekend 18-19/06/77
Christ takes us gently, He takes His time.
Well, let's take the Lord's time too!
Sessions in Paray 09-21/07/77 "From prayer group to community
It is obvious that at the beginning of our spiritual life we have to listen, to sit at the feet [of the Lord]. We are always at the beginning […] But if we start to get agitated and say: “Thank you Lord, I will act for you”, well, we don’t do good things because we have not received the necessary graces to act, because we have not been asked. So there’s this first very important part: this rest from God […] It’s the Lord saying to us, ” Take a rest, listen to me and I will transform you.” So the second point is that, after we have been at rest, after we have enjoyed the Lord, after we have listened to Him, after He has really delved deeply into us, after He has transformed us, we go through purifications that we can call deserts… We will learn how to love, how the Lord hides himself so that we love him more… And then we come to the fire of God’s love. If we ask the Lord when we are in the desert: “You see I keep falling back, I don’t come out of it but I walk anyway, I don’t know very well where I am going but I walk anyway”, if we beg the Lord and if we don’t lean on ourselves at all, if we really ask the Lord to come and burn us, [He will do it]. […] The simplest thing is to ask for fire, the fire of heaven: that it comes into us. It is a purifying fire. He makes a fire of joy with our sins (it’s very good) and after that [the sin] disappears because it’s really His fire that burns. And then that fire comes into our heart. You don’t know where to go because there is this fire everywhere and this fire leads you to love your neighbor, to love the Lord. It becomes a very great suffering but it is a suffering of love and it is this one that really transforms us. And as it burns us completely, obviously, we illuminate others if we burn ourselves! And finally it helps everyone. It’s really this fire! So as long as we don’t have this fire, well, we will never get very far. So this fire doesn’t come immediately to transform us, it often comes after all these trials of purification in the desert, but we must ask for it.
Weekend "Emmanuel" 25-26/10/75 Saturday 25/10/75
Faith / Trust in God / Obedience
Pierre had just refused to take responsibility for the prayer groups in 1973 and he asked Sister Ignatius Marie for advice: “But that’s not right at all,” she told him, “you’re the one who’s going to take over all that. – Oh no, certainly not!”
I panicked completely. And then she looked so sad (so deeply disappointed) that it still touched me. “I look like I’m refusing discernment”; I realized that was cowardly of me. Finally, I said yes. Saying yes relaxed me completely, I didn’t have any anxiety or panic at all, I received strength and momentum. I understood that being a poor guy, the Lord would do the work and that I didn’t have to worry about it.
So it began. From that day on I felt like I was on my bike. I felt that the Holy Spirit was like a [racing] coach and that I had to follow the coach’s little wheel…. And then the Lord said to me, “Go, go, faster, faster. I said, “Now I have to watch [the others] behind. – Don’t worry about them, just go, go!”
Interview by Laurence Dario for the magazine Il est Vivant 10/87
I must tell you that I had almost no charisms. I had only one charism, that of discernment. And I said to myself: "But why do I torment myself since it is the Holy Spirit. I'm a poor guy, like this, well, the Holy Spirit will do the work!" That's how it happened!
Community weekend at Chezelles 19/11/88
If we adore, we really feel poorer and poorer, but we put ourselves entirely in the arms of Jesus. And we really ask him to open our hearts… And his Heart warms us, burns us. We burn with love and then we radiate. And as we burn with love, well, whether we are in prayer, or with the sick, or whatever, we are always burning with love and we see Jesus everywhere.
Meeting Fraternity of Jesus 25/06/77
I really like this “without me you can do nothing” because it’s magnificent, it’s radical, we can do nothing. So we don’t have to be worried. We say that we can do nothing, so we have to ask the Lord for everything.
Really, when we are in adoration, we remain in his Love, we ask for this grace to remain in his Love. But to abide in his Love is not only to be in adoration: one comes to reside in adoration and then one must live all one’s life with this Love, to abide in this Love, so that, when one sees brothers, one abides in his Love and receives them in his Love.
This is theoretical, but practically speaking, it is a life that grows in us every day, and if we always ask the Lord for it, since we cannot do anything without Him.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
The more Christ was humbled, the more we are humbled, the more we are in glory: we are really in the glory of the Lord. And if we really take it like that, then we are victorious, we are not defeated. You are only defeated when you want to be, and when you give in to defeat. If you don’t want to be defeated, you’re not defeated, because the Lord is there and He’s got you. He is Somebody!”
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
“I try to do what I can. And then I fail a lot, and then I have empty hands and I will be so happy to present myself empty-handed before the Lord. Because he, with his mercy, will fill everything. And it will be an even greater mercy because He will have everything to fill in me.” So you see, it’s really these feelings of peace, smallness and love that we need to have. So it’s very simple, but it relaxes us a lot!
Community Weekend 01/04/79
Faith is exercised. We have to start by asking (the Lord) for the little things in our daily lives. When we see that it happens, we trust more and more. Afterwards, the Lord asks us for bigger things and our trust grows. Trust is the theological virtue of hope; and faith and hope lead us to this fire of love.
Preparatory notes for a teaching session summer 1980
Confidence is the daughter of hope and this is understandable because you need to have faith; and to have confidence you need love. We must really love and at that moment we believe in what the Lord gives us.
Community Weekend 18-19/12/76
To live by faith is this: to say to the Lord:
"You ask us for things, it is very good,
we will do what you ask us."
Community Weekend Spring '79
The Lord always tells us, “Take care of Me, I will take care of you.” That’s a very good deal!
Interview on 23/05/76
This is true in the workplace. You cannot obey God and obey men. So, the easiest thing to do is to choose the Lord! It is obvious that there are human conceptions that are not God’s conceptions. One can gently, in prayer and in work say, “Lord, how do you want obedience to your will and at the same time work?” And little by little you will see how it can change, how you can talk to the boss… But you must have faith!
Community Weekend Spring '79
The amazing thing about the Lord is that you always win! If it works, we are happy; if it doesn’t, we are even happier. That’s all. It is extraordinary this freedom of the children of God! Thank you Jesus!
Fraternity Retreat August 78. 09/08/78 Morning
In the ministry, for example, when things are not going well we say [with faith], “Well Lord you are bringing forth loaves of bread on these stones!” And then He manages! The Lord is there, He is at our service, we must use Him. But really because He loves us, and that is normal. That’s why our faith has to grow more and more. And, like that, we manage to convert others!
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat first week of August 1st teaching
In this day and age… we can only hold on if we follow Jesus. And if we have faith and a very strong grace that we ask the Lord. Because in difficult times, in impossible times, the Lord gives special graces of protection and strength. […] We must ask, by praying together, that the Lord give us a gift of strength. And the Lord only asks to provide it.
Community weekend 30-31/05/81
Small sacrifices… it’s annoying, because it’s so small that no one can say you can’t do it!
Community Weekend 04-05/04/81
If you start, it’s the first step that counts. […] It’s a matter of habit! When you start making sacrifices, you keep making sacrifices. Especially if you make them for love. It’s not the sacrifices for the sake of making sacrifices, “because I’m a good guy, because I want to be voluntary and strong-willed; and then I do everything by the strength of my hand: I’m a great saint by what I try to do.” And Pierre recalls that Therese, exhausted, rendered unable to do what she would have liked, could always make tiny little sacrifices. So she made them. It’s that childhood spirit. It’s not dumbing down but simplifying, and doing it out of love.
Community Weekend 4/17/82
For example, in the park there are papers lying around. I say, “Well, pick up a paper!” So you go out and you all pick up papers! But I say: “Pick up papers when you are not seen!” … But yes!… You know it, but do you do it? Well, start doing it. Start and you will constantly make sacrifices, you will have a need to make sacrifices!
Fraternity of Jesus Paray summer 83 retreat. Teaching 24/07/83
Little things like that all the time, well it puts you in the presence of the Lord. All these little sacrifices, it puts us in a state of love and in a state of attentiveness to the Lord.
Community Weekend 4/17/82
(about small sacrifices) You will tell me: “It’s childish!” Well, if it is childish, if it is so simple, let’s do it!
Community Weekend 04-05/04/81
The Lord wants us to have a very strong faith
and very humble means to rely only on Him.
Preparatory notes for a teaching session summer 1980
They say: “Oh, making sacrifices, it’s useless, it’s ridiculous, it’s like the good deeds that the scouts used to do… well, they are children!” But precisely, they are children, but we must become little children again, the Lord always tells us. So we must take these sacrifices that children make very seriously, and often they lead them to holiness. […] So we must put ourselves in this school of simplicity and prayer, and of these small sacrifices.
Fraternity of Jesus Easter Retreat 82
Practically speaking, how can one be radical? Well, we are radical like Therese of the Child Jesus, by making small sacrifices, but continually. Small sacrifices of self-love, of will, of listening to the other before speaking to him… we listen to him… You feel all this very well and it is fantastic because it leaves us in the Lord and it also leaves us in our state duty: it is to do our state duty even better. The Lord asks us something? Well, we do it better, we do it for Him. […] With this, the Lord keeps us: He keeps us in love, in His Love.
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat. August 78 09/08/78 Afternoon.
St. Therese said it well: “I have taken the Lord by a thousand small sacrifices and that is why I will be so well received.” Because these little sacrifices are sacrifices of love and love transforms everything. It is not the things that we do, but the love with which we do them.
Community Weekend 14-15/06/80
Then this dullness of each day can be transformed into love of the Lord. Therese said, “Instead of ecstasy, I prefer the mediocrity of each day.” And mediocrity in a carmel where it is cold, ugly, and where there are little sisters who are more or less successful, it is not funny you know! [Therese transformed everything into love, that’s what’s magnificent! Well, we must transform everything, in family life, in office life… in the subway, everywhere. If we do this (it’s a question of habit!), these small sacrifices generate in us a presence of the Lord, and little by little we arrive at continuous prayer.
Community Weekend 25/01/81
These small sacrifices are also acceptances of services, small services on the right, on the left ... what we are asked to do. And this creates in the same community or with those around us a real love, a joy, a true charity.
Fraternity of Jesus Easter Retreat 82
If you have services that don’t seem to you to be very nice, you say: “Even so, I’m so intelligent, and I’m asked to do that! It’s not normal! Well, too bad, I accept; well, it’s still not very pleasant! If we do it for Jesus… ah! for Jesus we would do anything! So that’s it: we do it for Jesus and we offer it as a sacrifice. And if it’s really love, if we transform everything into love, well, everything is love. That’s what’s extraordinary.
Community Weekend 4/17/82
Every time someone asks for something, the more annoying it is, the more you say: “Oh, but I would like to go! And little by little you will see that it makes you change. You start to become happy; and you manage to weigh less! […] Because you have left a lot of self-esteem, a little self-esteem on the right and on the left.
Small sacrifices like that transform you. It’s very silly but it’s very simple. Try it and you’ll see!
Community Weekend 14-15/06/80
We talk a little too much… so we say, “When I don’t feel like talking, I talk. When I feel like talking, I shut up.” You see, the opposite! It’s not difficult, we always do the opposite of what we would like to do. And like that, we don’t say bad things about others!
Community Weekend 14-15/06/80
“Every time I had a little annoyance,” she said, “I smiled.” Do as Therese did: she would pick out the one who was most annoying, give her her best smile; and she was happy
Fraternity of Jesus Retreat 31/12/79
We offer everything to Jesus, everything that happens to us, the pleasant and unpleasant things. And especially the good things because it is with the good things in general that we get clouded and we withdraw from the Lord.
Community weekend 17/04/82
You make sacrifices and you have a little notebook, a “little love notebook” where you say, “Jesus, I did this for you.” It’s kind of silly…but you do it for Jesus! If you do all this for Jesus, you realize that at the end of the day or the week you have done quite a bit. So that encourages you… [But sometimes] you realize that you haven’t done much! So, you see, it’s important to take stock… It’s important that all the time, you hold on tight, gently but firmly.
Community Weekend 4/17/82
When the time of greater trials comes, if we have not prepared ourselves a little with small sacrifices, being in the love and simplicity of the child, and humility, well, we will have some surprises!
Fraternity of Jesus Easter Retreat 82
When I let small sacrifices go that I could have made, well, I put up with having less peace and I say to the Lord, "There, I am a child and I am still empty-handed, and I trust in you." She keeps her trust in the Lord.
Community Weekend 04-05/04/81
We can humbly ask the Lord for this charity, and then, through small sacrifices at the school of Therese, little by little we will advance in this way of love which is the golden way.
Fraternity of Jesus Easter Retreat 82
Little by little like this, without realizing it, you can lead a life that is really all about love, and you do it from one little sacrifice to the next.
And then you will see what the Holy Spirit will teach you and propose to you.
[Every day is enough. And we see what the Lord is asking of us as we go along. And we will arrive on the other side. We will be in joy and we will find Therese who will receive us very kindly and who will say: “You have understood my little secret! Well, you see, it is succeeding very well, and the elevator 138 has not broken down!” It’s wonderful!
Fraternity of Jesus Easter Retreat 82
The Lord is master of his grace, but he counts on the sacrifices of all. And then He distributes them generously to this or that place, as He sees fit. But it would not work so well if others did not sacrifice. St. Paul did say “one has sown and the other reaps.”
Community weekend 20/09/81 3rd intervention (start)
So, says Peter, we must redouble our prayers and small sacrifices so that conversions will abound and France and Europe will be transformed… and, (he adds elsewhere), the whole world! Amen! Hallelujah!
Community Weekend 18/12/82
