The day began with Mass, presided over by Stanley Lubungo, at the Church of the Holy Spirit, which drew a good turnout from the parish and the town. Having seen the poster or heard the announcement of the event by the parish priest, the parishioners were drawn to rediscover this famous figure, who had unfortunately fallen into oblivion in their town.
Then the pilgrims, joined by faithful from the city, retraced the steps of Lavigerie, beginning with the Church of the Holy Spirit parish where Charles Lavigerie’s parents were married and where he was baptised, the Holy Spirit fountain where, as a child, he baptised his Jewish friends from the neighbourhood during plays, houses in various neighbourhoods where members of his family lived, his monument in the city centre, the bishop’s palace where he announced to the bishop his vocation to be a ‘“countryside priest”’, the cathedral, and the high school where he studied with other illustrious Bayonne citizens. The tour was a true pilgrimage, filled with historical information, reflections and prayers!
In the afternoon, the tour took us to St. Etienne Cemetery, where we recited a rosary with words attributed to Lavigerie as ‘mysteries’ at the ‘Lavigerie tomb’, which had been cleaned for the jubilee, where his mother and other family members are buried. We also visited another cemetery where many White Sisters are buried in different scattered vaults: we saw two of them, the ones closest to the entrance. As preparations were underway for All Saints’ Day and the commemoration of the faithful departed, the cemeteries were bustling with activity, with people cleaning and decorating the graves: a sign of communion between the faithful in Heaven and on earth. And yet another opportunity to bear witness: our large, multicultural group of about 30 people could not go unnoticed!
The tour ended at Lavigerie’s birthplace, where the SMNDA was present with a community of elderly sisters located in Huire, in the St. Bernard district, from 1926 to 1999. His family had to sell the estate to move to the St Esprit district: Lavigerie experienced detachment at a very early age…
Detachment was also experienced by the White Sisters who bought the house for a community in 1948 and sold it when they left Bayonne. Their memory lives on in a street and a bus stop bearing their names. During the Second World War, the Germans occupied the house, leaving it in a deplorable state. The family who lived there no longer wanted to live there. At that time, after the Sisters left, the house was offered to the Missionaries of Africa, who did not wish to acquire it. Father Stanley seemed touched to hear this, and we thought we could sense a desire growing in him for our missionary family to be present in Bayonne…
The pilgrims gathered afterwards for a round table discussion in the new auditorium of the Bayonne media library, which was inaugurated for the occasion. The speakers, two members of the family on the side of Lavigerie’s maternal aunt Latrilhe, a historian, Etienne Rousseau-Plotto, the Superior General of the SMNDA, Angela Kapitingana, and a General Councillor of M.Afr, Aloysius Ssekamatte, conveyed Lavigerie’s passion for God and for humanity, which has become their passion too.
Family members said, for example, that as a child, Lavigerie and his friends would play at celebrating Mass and later told clumsy clerics that he himself knew how to say Mass at the age of 10. Or when people told him that he would go straight to Heaven with the saints, he would contradict them, saying that he would be bored there if he only had to deal with perfect people. Family legend also has it that Lavigerie aspired to be elected Pope; this has some historical basis.
Among other things, the historian mentioned a few people from Bayonne who influenced the Cardinal’s life: a Jesuit, Father Xavier de Ravignan, who was his mentor in Paris and introduced him to the Œuvre d’Orient, and a childhood friend who became a painter, Léon Bonnat, who in 1888 painted the portrait we all know!
For their part, the Missionaries of Africa, a sister and a priest, spoke of the spirituality of the apostle and Lavigerie’s charisma, the challenges of mission in the African world today, and the collaboration of the White Fathers and White Sisters in this mission.
The facilitator of the roundtable, an elected city official, said he was both touched and moved by the speakers and also challenged by their presentations. He remarked, ‘The story of Lavigerie raises questions that are still relevant today,’ and he thanked the Lavigerian missionary family on behalf of the city of Bayonne. There are many questions to be addressed that touch on the foundations of our vision of humanity.
By: Gisela Schreyer, Marie-Christine Rousseau and Pierre Petitfour.