A Tour of the Madonna House Training Centre

Vianney House, the Priesthood, and our Archives

Let's take a short drive now, up to Carmel Hill, where Vianney House is located. Vianney House serves as home for a number of permanent priest members of Madonna House as well as a guest house for visiting bishops and priests. It overlooks the scenic Madawaska River Valley below.

Here is offered a unique opportunity for visiting priests to step aside from the pressures of parish work and ministries and spend time in prayer and rest. Priests are encouraged wherever possible to participate in meals, work, and prayer with the community so as to absorb the spirit of Madonna House in a nuts and bolts way. There is also the possibility of retreats or time in poustinia according to individual needs.

Since Vianney House was built, hundreds and hundreds of priests have passed through and been refreshed and encouraged by this unique experience. (For more information, see our programs for priests.)

Through exposure to Catherine's vision, all of the staff of the apostolate have become attuned to the needs of the priesthood and the Church. These are a few of her thoughts on the priesthood:

From the beginning of my apostolate, when I sold everything I owned, God has given me a great love for the Church and for her priests. This Church cannot die. Call me naive or crazy, for I am, but the Church is precious to me, and I will continue to love her. Further, I can see clearly that Christ lives in her in a visible way.

Christ went to his Father after his resurrection, but didn't want to leave us, so we have the priesthood!

In his immense love, Christ chose men who would have his hands and his feet, in whom he could walk, in whom he could forgive sins, who could lift him up, who could give us the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist — the Bread and Wine, which he said makes for life everlasting! The incredible love of God is visible to us.

Consider, on your knees, the mystery of God's love for us, that he didn't want to leave us orphans. He wanted to give us someone in whom we would see his resemblance. I don't mean his physical resemblance, but that which he really was: the Lover, the Tender One, the Forgiving One, the Servant. Someone who would do what he did: wash the feet of humanity while by a simple gesture of hands and a few words, he also washed their souls. Christ comes to us in such tremendous simplicity of love that it takes one's breath away! A priest brings to us everything that Christ would bring to us.

All of us must pray that priests have the type of love that lifts you and me up to God. The love of a priest is a benediction, for it is God loving you.

In every priest Christ walks across the width and breadth of our whole land. There are no nooks and corners where he isn't present. Though men as yet are not converted to God, that will come in time, for Christ is the Lord of history. Think of that! Ponder over it!

For Christ knew our hunger for himself. He knew that we would be walking around in the darkness of a thousand wars and miseries throughout this life. He knew that people would not all accept his commandment of love. He knew that we would be angry and kill each other and hurt each other. In order to have someone walk over the waters as he did, the waters of all those miseries of man, and to bring his peace there, he enters into the ones he has chosen as priests.

That doesn't mean that every priest you meet is holy in the sense that kids in the first grade, or even we who are 70 years old, may think of holiness. He is holy because Christ in him is holy, and because he stands, no matter where he goes, before the All Holy, the Trinity, who is reflected in him. So he is as if he were not: God is in him!

Priests, as human beings, often understand very little, and as human beings do not forgive very well. Priests are human beings like you and me. Sometimes they encompass only a very small part of the spiritual territory, but don't kid yourself, don't be deluded! A priest is holy ground, walking about. What he can't do, Christ in him can do!

A priest is a man whose goal is to be another Christ. A priest is a man who lives to serve. If he isn't, then Christ in him will be the servant, yours and mine, and if the priest doesn't feel like being another Christ, the Christ in him will be revealed more clearly if only you and I have eyes to see.

The priests of Madonna House are in the very heart of our vocation and are guardians of its spirit. Through their humble service, they play an integral role in the training and ongoing direction and formation of each staff worker.

Also on Carmel Hill is our Madonna House archives building. One of Catherine's favourite phrases was “pass it on!” She shared her immense reverence for heritage in many ways, one of which was encouraging the construction of the archive building in 1974 to preserve the extensive materials which she had collected over the years. She called them “pulsating, living records of an ‘apostolate-in-the-making,’ still pioneering, still being part of the history of the Church and several nations.”

The Madonna House archives reflects Catherine's remarkable sense of history. Its large collection focuses on records pertaining to both Catherine and Eddie Doherty, Friendship House and the Madonna House apostolate throughout the world.

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