In a question-and-answer session with the 140 members of the all-girls Catholic college prep school’s senior class, he spoke of his devotion to St. Francis de Sales and St. Edith Stein (also known as Sr. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross).
He spoke of the life and background of St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), eventually was named bishop of Geneva, Switzerland.
“A generation earlier, the reformer John Calvin had preached in Geneva, and the Catholics had been expelled, so he was bishop of a city he couldn’t even visit,” the archbishop said.
But while St. Francis could not minister to his flock in his see city, his preaching helped bring many people back to the Church and he still serves as an inspiration today.
“Another person I admire very much is St. Edith Stein. She was a German Jew, who grew up in a town that after the Second World War became part of Poland, Breslau, later Wroclaw.
“At university, she was, for all practical purposes, an agnostic, but she became interested in a very advanced, ground-breaking philosophy (which came to be known as Phenomenology). The philosopher was Edmund Husserl, and in Germany at that time, great professors were like rock stars,” Archbishop Vigneron explained.
He told how the young St. Edith “became part of a circle of very brilliant, high-powered grad students,” which brought her into contact with Catholics.
“She was very impressed with their sense of faith and serenity,” the archbishop continued.
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While visiting the home of one of her fellow students, she happened to pick up and become absorbed in the autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila. “She was so impressed by what St. Teresa wrote that she decided ‘this is what I want,’” Archbishop Vigneron told the seniors.
St. Edith finished her doctorate and became a professor herself. Besides her work in philosophy, she championed the cause of women’s education.
Later, she felt called to become a cloistered nun. Her order got her out of Germany to avoid the Nazi persecution, but Holland turned out to be no refuge when the Nazis conquered it, too.
She was arrested and sent to the infamous Auschwitz concentration camp in occupied Poland, where she was executed in 1942.
“The professor she worked for (Husserl) was the philosopher I studied intently in college, so — while separated in time — I have a sense of us being colleagues,” he added.
Archbishop Vigneron asked the seniors what they valued most about their time at Marian, and several spoke of how well-prepared they felt, academically, for college – a number already having received their acceptance letters from prestigious institutions.
He told them he hoped they were also prepared “to maintain the integrity of a Christian life.”
“I hope you have the courage to live a Christian life, and feel the freedom to be holy and to live up to the teachings of Jesus.”
