On December 8th, we celebrate the 160th anniversary of the offering that Bishop de Marion Brésillac, with his firsts companions, made of the nascent Society to our Lady of Fourvière at Lyon. the new general secretary, Fr. Sylvère Atta, helps us give thanks and meditate on this birth. He made us reflect on a very current aspect of our mission today and thus how we can also renew the charism of our Founder.

Get up, take the little child and his mother, flee to Egypt and stay there till I speak to you, for Herod will seek out the little child to put him to death. (Mt 2:13)

A contextual analysis of this passage in the gospel of the childhood of Our Lord Jesus Christ assimilates the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt at a time of exile. The infant Jesus, with his parents, experienced migration with its constraints and sorrows. Can we see in the current mass migratory movement, a messianic opportunity, a prophetic sign? For us missionaries, sons and daughters of Brésillac and of Planque at the service of the destitute and the powerless, what interpretation inspired by our founder do we make of migration?

It would perhaps be wrong to say that our dear founder, Mgr de Marion Brésillac, who lived from 1813 to 1859, only 46 years of the past century (XIXth century), was confronted with the problem of migration as we see it today. We can persuade ourselves that if he had witnessed this phenomenon which remains a wound for humanity and which is intolerable for the human conscience, would arouse the indignation and a proportional reaction of the bishop of the missions. Besides, he was himself a French priest on mission in India, and therefore an expatriate, who had already, in his day, rubbed himself with the reality of the integration that requires living elsewhere than at home.

The history of his life tells us that he spent a good part of his time in India, first as a vicar then as the rector of the seminary and then as bishop, to fight injustice in its various forms, censure everything that lowers man in his dignity as a child of God and then restores justice. Bishop de Brésillac has always been affected by human sufferings, whether physical, moral or spiritual. For him, everything that is degrading, no matter who makes the cost, does not deserve to be encouraged but fought with the force of prayer and persuasion.

It is in this missionary impulse deeply marked by the «Marionist» spirituality, the spirituality of promptness and pragmatism that the SMA General House in Rome has hosted two African migrants since last year. The number was revised upwards in October with the arrival of two others following the solemn appeal of Pope Francis for migrants.

Indeed, in an appeal addressed to the Human Community, Pope Francis, on the question of migration, not only recommended a new look but also, as a sign of solidarity with the suffering humanity, invited the West world to Welcome migrants into homes and families. In this call, he insisted on the importance of a direct face to face with them to tame the fear felt by many towards them. He explains that in theory, one cannot close one’s heart to a refugee

The Community Via della Nocetta appropriated this call and joined in solidarity, was available to the reception of the «brother from elsewhere». Accepting the other in its racial, cultural and religious difference … is at the same time a necessity but also a challenge that must nevertheless be dared. The reasons for the migratory phenomenon as old as the world are multiple: the quest for well-being, the escape of spaces of armed conflict, economic distress, or just «an ambiguous adventure» in the pursuit of a dream to name but a few. Today it has reached unimaginable and uncontrolled proportions. Confronted with this phenomenon, the host countries show their unease at the outbreak of the situation. This, rightly or rightly confirms their refusal to receive «all the misery of the world». However, calls are made to excite the philanthropic string in order to act. Our world is at the crossroads of history where on the one hand there is a third world that lies in abysmal situations of poverty and despair and on the other a society that offers the mirage/ disillusion of a paradisal life.

It is true that the fear of the other, of the foreigner, weakens the goodwill and even plagues the religious revival. However, there is urgency and we must act now; It is a tragedy and it cannot and must not endure. Some propose to address the problem at its root. But how to solve this thorny problem without rethinking the whole of humanity. Consider circumscribing this phenomenon without returning to the creator’s project would be a vain adventure

What to do?

On this subject Brésillac tells us in a pragmatic voice that he «does not hold to such or such a means in particular, provided that we take those which are not illusory. » (Letter to M. Jean Tesson, Director at the Seminary of Paris, Coimbatore, November 1, 1853, LE, 0620). Does not mankind in any place have a duty to welcome? In Mt 25: 34-36 Christ makes the transcendence of oneself towards and for the other the sine qua none condition of access to eternal life. Bishop Brésillac adopted these words of Christ, of welcoming the other as a priority to the point of meeting him and accepting martyrdom for the salvation of souls.

The occasion is fortuitous on this 160th anniversary of the existence of the work to congratulate, in addition to countries and NGOs, all the religious institutions and consequently the dismemberments of the SMA and other associations that stand alongside migrants.

Happy are you migrants, dead on the way, the kingdom of heaven will be opened to you, and there you will find a land of welcome, where there are neither Jews nor Greeks, Turks, Syrians, Africans or men Free, neither slaves, rich, nor poor, but the merciful arms of God to comfort you.

Sylvère Atta