26 September 1989
Buenos Aires, Argentina

My dear Sisters and Confreres,

The author of a short book of the Bible, that of Ecclesiastes, takes a special delight in reminding us that there is nothing new under the sun. If he were alive today and heard us talking about the importance of liberation theology, he might shake his head and say: "Did I not tell you more than two thousand years ago that there is nothing new under the sun...?" Liberation theology is not new. One of the most important books of the Old Testament is taken up largely with that idea. The Book of Exodus is an account of how the Israelite people were liberated from the Egyptians, and the remainder of the Old Testament is a celebration of that liberation which was repeated again and again throughout their history. For centuries the Israelites celebrated it faithfully each year in the Feast of the Passover. The first reading of today's Mass tells us how, after their return to Jerusalem from Babylon, they dutifully celebrated the Feast of the Passover in the new temple. The Feast of the Passover will always remain significant for the Christians, for it was in the course of celebrating the Passover, or the great liberation from Egypt, that Our Lord instituted the Sacrifice of the Mass. Our Lord's own sacrificial death is the great liberation of mankind and each Mass is a celebration of that event.

When we speak of liberation today, our minds center upon the poor. We think, not only of the sufferings of the poor, but in a special way of sufferings that are caused to them through the injustice of others. When we think about how they can be liberated, we think in a particular way how we could achieve greater social justice in our society.

All of us are aware of the immense work which in his lifetime St. Vincent de Paul accomplished to liberate the poor of his day from their sufferings. It must be said that explicit references to injustice, as being the cause of their sufferings, are few in his writings. He was a man of his time and the demands of social justice, as well as the responsibilities of ownership, had not been spelled out as clearly as they have been in our day. If St. Vincent de Paul was a man of his time, it must not be forgotten that he was also a man of the Church. Listen to this: "the sort of liberation we are talking about, knows how to use evangelical means, which have their own distinctive efficacy. It does not resort to violence of any sort or to the dialectics of class struggle. Instead, it relies on the vigorous energy and activity of Christians, who are moved by the spirit to respond to the cries of countless millions of their brothers and sisters." (Puebla p486).

Take out the word 'dialectics' from that quotation and it would fit quite easily in almost any of St. Vincent's letters. It is, in fact, a quotation from the document of Puebla. St. Vincent would be the first to agree that "whatever the miseries or sufferings that afflict human beings, it is not through violence, power plays or political systems, but through the truth about human beings that they will find their way to a better future." (Puebla p551).

St. Vincent de Paul was, above all, a man of the Gospel, and in his correspondence, in his contacts, he was never far from the Person of Jesus Christ. The pages of his correspondence and of his conferences are penetrated by the Gospel. It is for that reason that it can be confidently asserted that on the theme of liberation, he would remind us, as the Document of Puebla does, that "we must try to read the political scene from the standpoint of the Gospel, not vice versa." (Puebla p559).

For St. Vincent de Paul--as for all the Saints of the Church--the formula for reaching sanctity is the same, namely, the accomplishment, at every moment of the day, of the Will of God. It is the formula proposed by Our Lord Himself in the Gospel of today. "My mother and My brothers are those who hear the word of God and act upon it." (Lk 8:21). It is a very simple formula, so simple that we can fail to see it, or if we see it, we can distort it by putting our own personal interpretations on what we think God should want. A young Vincentian priest did a doctoral thesis in Rome three years ago on St. Vincent's spirituality. The title of his dissertation was: "The Fulfillment of the Will of God was the Unifying Principle between Action and Prayer in St. Vincent de Paul." Yes, we accomplish the Will of God through action in our lives. It must, however, be action that springs from prayer. It is only in that way that we can feel certain that our action is an expression of God's Will in our lives.

Let us allow St. Vincent to speak. To a young priest of his Community, who sought his advice one day, St. Vincent said: "Jesus Christ, Who should be the exemplar of all your conduct, was not content with employing sermons, labors, fasts and even His blood and death itself, but He also added prayer to all that. He had no need whatsoever of prayer for Himself, and hence it was for us that He prayed so fervently, and also to teach us to do the same, both in regard to all that concerns ourselves and all that concerns those of whom we should be, with Him, the Saviors." (Coste XI, Fr. ed., pp. 345-346).