Émile Anizan

Émile Anizan (born January 6, 1853 in Artenay , † May 1, 1928 in Paris ) was a French Roman Catholic clergyman and Social Catholic, Superior of the Fathers and Brothers of Saint Vincent de Paul and founder of the Sons of Christian Love .

Origin and training to be a priest

Jean-Émile Anizan's father was a doctor. Relatives of his mother were Romain-Frédéric Gallard, Bishop of Meaux , and Constant Gallard, chaplain to the Empress Eugénie . He grew up as the third of four surviving children and first went to school in Artenay, where he had Charles Gibier (1849-1931), who later became Bishop of Versailles , a classmate. When he was nine he went to boarding school in Orléans . From 1872 he attended the seminary of the Sulpician in Paris.

Difficult entry into the congregation

In 1874 he discovered the religious of Saint Vincent de Paul, met their founder, Jean-Léon Le Prevost , and decided to devote his life as a priest to the service of the poor. When he was ordained a priest in 1877, however, his attempt to join failed due to the resistance of the bishops Félix Dupanloup (until 1878) and Pierre-Hector Coullié . From 1878 he was chaplain in Olivet , from 1885 in Orléans in a community that was mainly populated by workers. After getting into a personal crisis, in 1886 Bishop Coullié finally allowed him to join the Congregation of Religious of Saint Vincent de Paul. After postulate and novitiate in Chaville , he came to the Sainte-Anne center in the Charonne working-class district in the 20th arrondissement of Paris in October 1887 . On December 8, 1888, he made his profession.

Apostles to the poor and workers

Anizan discovered the district through systematic home visits to the most needy, following the example of the Vincentian Rosalie Rendu . He founded the aid organization “Holy Family” and relied on the workers and their wives who had already been accepted to spread the apostolate. So-called “committees for the good” performed religious lay work with neighbors and work colleagues. In addition, he founded union-like groups. By 1894 he became a shepherd of the people and an apostle of the poor. His exclamation from this time has been handed down: "Oh, if the rich only knew!" (Ah! Si les riches savaient!)

In 1894 Anizan rose to the rank of second man (after the Superior General) in his congregation. He saw his confreres as "true monks" of the 19th and 20th centuries. The only reproach he still had to make against himself and them was: “We are not careless enough” ( On n'est pas assez imprudents ). In 1899 the congregation reached out to Italy, Belgium and Canada. Anizan became secretary and vice-president of the Association of Catholic Workers' Associations, in whose organ L'Union , founded in 1900 . Revue mensuelle de l'Union des associations ouvrières catholiques he wrote more than a hundred articles by 1914. In it he highlighted the common people as the true sacrifice of the modern world, to whom the essential devotion of the church should apply.

Election to the superior and deposition

What now emerged and broke out in 1913 was the internal division of the Congregation into two camps with different views on the priorities to be set. Anizan was of the opinion that at the center of Christian commitment in his day was the poor working class. In contrast, the other camp put the struggle of the church against theological and social modernism at the top of the list. This camp refused, like the majority of French Catholics, the Pope Leo XIII. in the encyclical Au milieu des sollicitudes recommended acceptance of democracy (in France under the catchphrase “ralliement” = rapprochement with the republic) and felt himself reinforced by the ultra-conservative Pope Pius X (1903–1914) in his refusal to be modern. Anizan's emphasis on the social came under suspicion of the socialist.

When the previous anti-modernist superior general had to be replaced in 1907, Anizan was elected superior with the help of cardinal Vives y Tutó and was able to lead the congregation in the direction of workers' pastoral work and the establishment of Catholic trade unions, but the cardinal died in September 1913 and won the opposing camp has the upper hand. Jules Saubat (1867–1949), priest of the Sacred Heart of Jesus , visited the congregation in Paris on behalf of the Holy See under the sign of the quasi-secret service persecution organization Sodalitium Pianum . He denounced a "social modernism" on Anizan's side. Anizan was removed from office in January 1914, a practice that was interpreted and largely endorsed by the French Catholic press ( La Croix , L'Univers) in the context of the conflict between modernists and traditionalists (integralists). The greater part of the congregation members resigned, which was connected with the fact that they were denied pastoral care in the dioceses of Paris and Versailles. Anizan came under in the diocese of Monaco .

Military chaplain

After a stay in the Charterhouse of Pleterje , Anizan left the congregation in July 1914 and was active as a secular priest and unofficial military chaplain in the Verdun area from August (until 1916) . In 1916 he was awarded the War Cross.

New foundation

After the setback in the spring of 1914, Anizan did not give up his ideal, but thought of founding his own congregation. In December of the same year he made private vows with three like-minded people (including Charles Devuyst, 1881–1931), which during wartime could not lead to an official foundation, but which attracted further confreres. From October 1915, Archbishop Cardinal Léon-Adolphe Amette reached Pope Benedict XV. a relaxation of the measures against Anizan, and in May 1916 the priest Daniel Fontaine (1862-1920) commissioned by the cardinal moved the Pope to appoint Anizan as pastor of the highly industrialized town of Clichy . From October 1916 he worked there in the parish Notre-Dame-Auxiliatrice ( Mary, Help of Christians ). On December 25, 1918 the Congregation "Sons of Christian Love" ( Fils de la charité ) was officially founded, whose task was defined as "évangélisation populaire, principalement dans les paroisses ouvrières" (evangelization of the broader people, mainly in workers' parishes) . In 1920 a novitiate was opened in Yerres . At the end of the year the Congregation had 33 professed, all of them former members of the religious of Saint Vincent de Paul. She took over other parishes in Paris (Rue de la Roquette), Colombes (Petit-Colombes), Le Kremlin-Bicêtre , Argenteuil and Athis-Mons .

Papal recognition of the congregation and death

After Anizan's preparatory meeting with Pope Benedict in Rome in December 1921, Pope Pius XI. on March 4, 1924, the Congregation's decree of recognition, for which Anizan was able to thank him personally in Rome in the spring of 1925.

In 1926 he founded the Congregation Auxiliatrices de la charité (helpers of Christian love) together with Thérèse Joly (1879–1956 ). In 1927 he met Joseph Cardijn , the founder of the international Christian working-class youth (CAJ). He died in 1928 at the age of 75.

Works

• Choix de lettres et d'écrits spirituels . Secrétariat des Fils de la charité, Issy 1949.
  • Choix de lettres et d'écrits spirituels de Jean-Émile Anizan, fondateur des fils de la Charité . Edited by Gabriel Bard. Paris 1998.
• Quand la charité s'empare d'un homme. Ecrits spirituels de Jean-Émile Anizan (1853–1928), fondateur des Fils de la Charité . Edited by Pierre Le Clerc and Jean-Yves Moy. Cerf, Paris 1992.
• Aumônier à Verdun. Journal de guerre et lettres du père Anizan . Edited by Jean-Yves Moy. Presses universitaires de Rennes, Rennes 2015, 2018 (preface by Pierre Tritz, 1914–2016).

literature

• L'apostolat popular. Le Père Anizan et les Fils de la Charité. Actes du colloque des 13 and 14 novembre 1992 . Edited by Pierre Le Clerc. Cerf, Paris 1995.
• Jean-Yves Moy (* 1944): Le Père Anizan, prêtre du peuple . Éditions du Cerf, Paris 1997 (preface by Jean-Marie Mayeur, 1933–2013).
• Jean-Yves Moy: Petite vie du Père Anizan . Desclée de Brouwer, Paris 2000.
• Philippe Bradel: Prier 15 jours avec Jean-Émile Anizan . Montrouge Nouvelle cité, Montrouge 2003.

Web links

• Information on Émile Anizan in the database of the Bibliothèque nationale de France .
• Literature by and about Émile Anizan in the SUDOC catalog (Association of French University Libraries )