Mother Salomé spoke very little of herself, wrote even less, and shortly before her death most of her writings were destroyed at her request.
On the day of her First Communion, young Marie-Renée prayed “to be a great saint by doing what God wants.” Even at the end of her life, it was still the same desire. Her nurse told her, “I think the good Lord is coming to get you.” And Mother Salomé repeated her favorite saying: “When He wants … I am not afraid.”
During the day, she often repeated this request to the holy Virgin: “Through your example, may the constant cry of my heart be that of Jesus: ‘Father, may your will and not mine be done.‘ ”
From this comes her devotion to daily duty, to ordinary actions. She writes: “We must work without ceasing for our sanctification. However, we cannot do it by extraordinary actions since these occasions are infrequent; it is therefore through ordinary actions that we must sanctify ourselves.” She made of her actions, as simple as they were, “a perpetual communion” with the will of God.
“For a soul who gave herself to Jesus through religious profession,” she said, “Jesus must be everything.” She wants to see this faith alive in her family: “How much we must have at heart, my beloved daughters, to keep it within us in all its integrity, so that it becomes like a challenge of love to this sad question from Our Lord to his apostles: “Do you think that the Son of man when he returns will still find faith on earth?”
Extract from a longer article in Sharing Trenta Aprile N° 1-2022
