Patience For Our Time (Le temps de la patience, notre temps)

Madeleine Chasles wrote this book at the end of WWII. It is a meditation on the virtue of patience. This virtue was put to good use during the war because people had to learn to be patient, to wait for the liberation of France. We learn some details on the life of Madeleine during the war as she retreated to the countryside and left her house at Loges-en-Josas. She became a goat girl, a shepherdess what we call in French a “chevriere” and she rediscovered the beauty of the countryside. Of course it doesn’t mean that she forgot about the sufferings of her countrymen. Her reason to write this book is that this virtue of patience which the French had to learn for the purpose of surviving the occupation should not be forgotten now that it is more than ever needed in our new world, a world which has experienced the use of the atomic bomb and is more violent and anti- God as ever. The first part of the book is about defining what patience means: Madeleine lived in the countryside for many years and naturally sees patience as a cardinal virtue which farmers and shepherds display almost intuitively. She quotes Virgil’s Georgics at length and reminisces (from her book “War and the Bible”) that the factory prepares for war but the plough for peace. So there are still important virtues to learn from the agricultural world especially now that we are accelerating the armament’s race. In working the earth, we learn the “earthly patience”. The earth teaches us patience. The second part is an investigation on Patience as exhibited in the bible by characters such as the Patriarchs, Moses, David and the prophets: Patience of the patriarchs, as their life unfolds without them allowed to understanding God’s plan and the divine scheme of history. But they trust God. Noah took more than 100 years to build his ark. Abraham walked across a continent to settle in Canaan. Abraham did not live to see the promises of God and died before they would be accomplished. Later Joseph as governor of Egypt could have gone back to Canaan to see his father. He remained in Egypt and waited for God act. First conclusion of Madeleine: our lives are woven like rays with some obscure some half lighted and we pursue our path without understanding God’s goals. Then Madeleine turns to the figure of Job. Job was patient in his sufferings. Instead of cursing God, he praised God. His soul was focused on God’s love. This gives us how patience can help us if we are sick and suffering: Continue to praise God, do not complain, thank him for his love. Nothing predestined Moses to become a leader of men , he was a shepherd for 40 years and complained that he could not speak to a crowd. Why does God choose the weakest? Moses abandoned himself in God’s hands. He became a leader, an arbitrator, an intercessor and a mediator. Prophets submitted to the will of God patiently and did not dare arguing with God. They knew they were being required to write or express the prophetic wisdom but did not get any information on the timing of their action. What does it mean to be patient: passive in God’s hands. Jeremiah was timid and weak. He accepted the mission entrusted by God despite the humiliations he was subjected to. As the apostle James writes: “happy are those who suffer patiently”. God has a plan which unfortunately has been delayed by mankind’s sinful activities. May be, David was supposed to be Christ but it was too early and time had to pass before the circumstances could allow this to happen. However beware, God is patient, his plan could not be fulfilled in David’s time, Christ had to come and the world of the New Testament unfold, but this time of patience will pass and there will be a time for judgment and the perpetrators will be punished. Then we come to the patience of Christ. Everything in the NT talks about patience: this is Mary awaiting the birth of Jesus whom she knows will have a unique destiny but is unaware of all the details yet submits patiently to God’s rule. Look at the patience of Christ at every step of Jesus’ passion. Now Madeleine turns to our daily life and how patience can help us go through the difficulties. We need patience because we are not the masters of time. Man is a well of worries. Contradiction: we would like time to accelerate as we want to reach our many goals as soon as possible however when we become old, we find life has been too short and we don’t want to die. Madeleine proposed that we keep always the figure of Christ in the center of our life. But the world we live in, has excluded God from all decisions all men make. Faith can elevate us to the position of “Son of God”. Madeleine looks at the patience of the saints, of the sick, of the handicapped. How to master one self and get rid of wrong habits. The ultimate recourse is God who can free us from all addictions. Quoting Psalm 25: “I turn my eyes towards God. God will free me from the net”. Let us be patient with weak people, with children, with handicapped, also with animals which we must respect and not allow to suffer for no reason. Let us be courteous. Such virtue is so eminently French! Have we forgotten it? Patience in illness: Madeleine mentions her old friend (the subject of another book) who has been paralyzed and confined to a bed for 25 years without any hope of a cure. As she meets him, she says to him:” you look happy”. And he answers: “Yes I am perfectly happy, I have accepted. I have understood I have started my eternity with God. Sometimes, there is a cloud but like an aviator, I fly above the clouds to look at God and not at myself” This is the message of this book, that patience is a divine virtue that allows us to come closer to God, and reach God in spite of all difficulties and sufferings we may experience this world.