Martyr of the Confessional
Beginning in 1830, thousands of people would come to Ars to confess with the Holy Curate. In the last year of his life would be more than one hundred thousand. Engaged up to seventeen hours a day to his confessional, to reconcile men with God, he was a true martyr of the confessional.
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Love that saves
Grabbed by the love of God, astonished at the vocation of man, he was aware of the madness that consisted in wanting to be separated from God. That is why he wanted each one to be free to enjoy God's love.
It was the same sanctity of the Curate of Ars that gave his word "so much" efficacy. Surely on the mouth of other those expressions would have passed through as common.
The words were like fiery darts that penetrated forever in the heart, and every accusation of the penitent gives him a cry of faith, commiseration, and horror even for the slightest deficiencies. Every word of his own was particularly touched by tenderness, and in shortness it was all the wrong that had been done to the soul.
From the confessor, every now and then, his unrestrained sighs that escaped from him were heard and caused penitents to feel sorrow and love. Men of every condition came from all the districts of France, some, to the touch of grace, were ready for all repairs.
His confessor was disposed day and night. His miracle by excellence was the conversion of sinners. He had a great joy in seeing the return of sinners to God. He could convert more than seven hundred people into a year.
The Curate of Ars loved the sinners very much and his love was as much as he hated sin. He hated evil and spoke of him with horror and indignation, but he had for the guilty a great compassion and his groaning for the loss of souls broke the heart. Each night, during prayer, the voice was broken for the emotion when he recited the phrase: "My God, you do not want the sinner to perish.
The sweetness with which the Holy Father welcomed the poor sinners had no weakness, required the sincerity of repentance otherwise he did not absolve. When the Curate of Ars had obtained from the penitents the sure signs of correction, he showed himself in extreme benevolence in the application of sacramental penance.
Don Vianney worked twenty hours, eleven at the confessional. Eleven or thirteen in the winter, fifteen or sixteen in the summer.
Don Vianney made confession the reason for his life. An irresistible force ascending from his heart urged him to be always at the disposition of the penitents, and they were looking for him very soon even before dawn.
Don Vianney personally played the Angelus to indicate that the church was open and that he was at the disposal of the penitents. While waiting, he prayed on the knees in front of the altar or recited his Breviary. When the influx of pilgrims became obscure, the Curate of Ars realized that he could not have heard all of them, even confessing all day. Sometimes he started to get up before midnight. However, as soon as he got up, his penitents were already waiting when he came to the church.
Don Vianney came in, glaring at the passage through the weak light of his lantern with broken glasses, already dressed in mended habit and violet stole. Crossing the vestibule, he opened the door of the church, and immediately the penitents, like a river, rushed to his confessional.
The Saint kneeled on the steps of the altar, elevating his soul. He offered all the punishment of that day to God, and begged him to have mercy on the poor sinners, then entered the confessional.
He had become a martyr of confession. If he wanted to, he could escape the sinners by not finding himself, but for the great love of souls he accepted everything.
To understand how much this Holy One was just to remember how some confessional hours may even extinguish rugged priests, the long and endless hours can quench, take away appetite and sleep with a sense of loss.
The curate of Ars, in the endless sessions at the confessional, did a job that would regularly tire at least six confessors. It looks like a miraculous event as it could withstand such fatigue, even suffering from infirmity with such an austere way of life.
In the summer, in his small church, the heat became so stubborn, that according to his affirmation, he gave him an idea of the pains of hell. He was tormented by migraine and when in the days of oppressive air the little nave became almost irrespirable, it caused the heroic confessor a real nausea. It did not go better in the winter, when the temperature dropped and the frost came with the wind of sunset, so that sometimes the Saint lost his senses.
For the Curate of Ars a good confession must be humble and total. You have to avoid all those unnecessary accusations, all those scruples that make the same thing a hundred times. Confessions and short words. Yet there was not only one of the penitents who did not feel subjected to a particular solicitude, a dedication always ready to take advantage of every minimal opening to the action of the Spirit, even that of the most hardened hearts. About the repair to be asked to the penitents, he said: I give them a little penance, and I will do the rest in their place. The thing that counts, says the Guardian, is to have at least a minimum of contrition of their sins.
"My children, we cannot understand God's goodness to set up this great sacrament. If we had had a grace to ask our Lord, we would never have imagined asking him this one. He predicted our fragility and our Inconstancy in good, and his love has led him to do what we would never have dared to ask him, "he writes.
That is why the treasure of divine mercy is inexhaustible, and no one can think of taking the gifts of grace into account. "His patience is waiting for us," reassures the curate. Moreover, "It is not the sinner who returns to God to ask for forgiveness, but it is God who goes after the sinner and makes him return to Him".
