MARIE-ROSE
FERRON:
STIGMATIC
Sunday morning, quiet reigns
over the cemetery grave of
Marie-Rose Ferron.
Silence that haunts –
full of mystery – presence.
Silence is not empty –
touches me
at my center – still point.
Silence watches over me as
a gentle cool morning breeze.
Silence is full – presence of the
divine – the Beloved –
full of presence of Marie-Rose –
full of mystery of life –
death – wars – violence –
injustices.
Marie-Rose wounds bleed from
these.
I sit in the silence
letting mystery touch – overwhelm
me.
It overwhelmed Marie-Rose –
her wounds bled from it.
Such is our journey in life –
we carry a heavy load – our sins
–
sins of the world.
I made a pilgrimage
to the grave of Marie-Rose.
I will never understand life –
its dark side –
Marie-Rose did not either.
She carried that burden –
wounds show it.
She will give me strength
To carry burden of living.
Robert Trabold
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PILGRIMAGE OF
SILENCE:
STIGMATICS
Robert Trabold
When we think of stigmatics, we
usually believe that they are people and a phenomenon of Europe, such as, Theresa
Neumann of Germany and Padre Pio of Italy. But if we do our homework, we will
find that there have been four Americans who have been stigmatics in recent
times. Marie-Rose Ferron, a French Canadian who immigrated to Woonsocket, RI
and died in 1936. Little Audrey Santo was a native of Worchester, Mass. and passed
away in 2007. The two others were Veronica Lueken, Bayside, New York, 1923 - 1995
and Rhoda Wise, Canton, Ohio, 1888 - 1948. During the year, I frequently attend
the various prayer sessions of the V. Lueken Movement and visit her gravesite
which is not far from where I live. Recently, I decided to make a pilgrimage to
the places in southern New England where M. R. Ferron and A. Santo lived and are
buried. In that area, another visionary
and stigmatic, Marie Esperanza from Venezuela, worked and was instrumental in
the founding of house of prayer, Betania 2, in Medway, Mass. These places are a
holy corner of the globe which was blessed with the presence of three saintly
people.
I made the pilgrimage by myself
and wanted it to be one of silence and meditation. The highlights of the trip
were the times of prayer at the gravesites of Marie-Rose and Little Audrey and
having the privilege of seeing the latter’s little chapel and room and the bed
where she suffered. The visits to the graves touched me very much because I
felt a silence which was so deep that it was not only an indication of the
stigmatic’s presence but also that of Jesus. The two stigmatics led me into the
presence of the divine. I usually visited the graves for up to an hour resting
in the quiet and mentioned certain petitions of the needs of myself and the
world. I had the privilege of being able to enter the chapel and bed room of
Little Audrey and I felt a deep silence there. Audrey led me into the presence
of Jesus and I was deeply touched. These two rooms had statues of Jesus which
in recent years have had blood and oil coming out of them. Upon investigation,
the blood is true human blood and the oil is genuine. This is truly a miraculous phenomenon since
these statues are made of plaster of Paris. In all, the heavens opened up for a
moment and preformed wonderful signs which should strengthen our faith and give
us confidence that God has not forgotten us.
In praying at the graves of the
stigmatics and visiting the chapel and room of Audrey Santo, I was confronted
with the great mystery of why certain people manifest the wounds of Christ on
their body. This phenomenon has been around for a while and St. Francis of
Assisi was the first one recorded in history. Stigmatics are people who have a
very intense love of Jesus and a desire to be attached and united to him. This
unity with the beloved Jesus leads them to share in his sufferings and as a result,
the wounds of the Lord appear on their bodies. This is the great mystery of
love which confronts us on visiting their places of residence and burial sites
and which we will never completely understand while we are on earth. We should
remember however that we are called to this unity with and love of Jesus in our
life time. Our daily faithfulness to contemplative prayer puts us into the
presence of the Lord who calls us to a deep union with him although we may
never share his physical wounds.
While praying at the various
sites of the stigmatics, I believe that we do participate in the wounds of Jesus
by our living. Our world is full of violence, hatred and endless wars and many
innocent lives are lost in such violence. Wars just go on and do not seem to
end. The stigmatics also lived in this world and carried the burden of its
endless violence and conflicts. They
intensely felt this and it was part of the pain of the wounds of Jesus. On top
of this, we humans have the pain of seeing and carrying our own sins and failings
and have this burden until our death. We may never have on our bodies the
physical wounds of Jesus but we have those interior wounds of suffering under
the injustices and violence of our world and our failings which never end. We
are stigmatics burdened with our world and a pilgrimage to Southern New England
hopefully will help us not get discouraged. It reminds us that we have to keep
our eyes on Jesus who is our hope and despite it all, had his Easter Sunday. He
will let us share in this victory.
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