Blessed Pauline Jaricot returns home

BLESSED Pauline Jaricot has returned home to the Maison de Lorette (House of Loreto) in Lyon, France after her family donated a very special relic to the site.

To commemorate the bicentenary of the Living Rosary by the Pontifical Mission Societies and the Archdiocese of Lyon, the family of Blessed Pauline Jaricot presented her white plaster death mask to the House of Loreto, to which a single eyelash of Pauline’s remains attached.

The presentation took place during a simple and intimate moment of prayer in the Chapel of St Philomena, in the house where Pauline lived from 1832 until her death—in poverty—in 1862. The house is considered by many to be a true haven of peace on a hillside between the Basilica of Fourvière and the Cathedral of St John the Baptist.

Marie-Dominique Escarron—a descendant of the Jaricot family—presented the precious mask on behalf of her cousin Jean-Paul, at whose home the relic had been kept. Born in 1944, Marie-Dominique looked with emotion at the railing of the stairs leading to Pauline's room.

"To think she used to touch this railing to go up these very stairs,” Marie-Dominique said. "For me, Pauline is 'Aunt Pauline.' She was my great-great-aunt—I am the fifth generation.

“In our family, the memory of Blessed Pauline has never been forgotten. We have always prayed to her. My mother made us pray in the evenings and she would talk to us about her. We prayed for all sorts of intentions. That is how I have always known Pauline.”

A former scout guide and then nurse, Marie-Dominique has long been committed to helping the most vulnerable. She sees her relative as a role model in her own life.

“You know, I do not think Pauline needs my testimony to be known!” she said. “I thought to myself that Pauline had accomplished things, so I got involved with people with disabilities in the town of Palaiseau, in the Paris region, where I lived for a large part of my life. It is not always easy, but I think it is a wonderful example and we have accomplished many things anyway,”

Being passionate about genealogy, Marie-Dominique began delving deeper into the life of the foundress of the Living Rosary when a cousin, Nicole, contacted her.

“When Nicole contacted me around the time the Friends of Pauline Jaricot Association was founded, I searched online for old books, thinking that after her Beatification, they would be harder to find,” she explained. “I found many works, including an 1893 edition of Les Contemporains.”

She likes to point out that if Pauline gave so much, it was also because she grew up surrounded by great family generosity.

“They were a very generous family,” she added. “Her mother was also very charitable, and I think they deserve to be Canonised as much as the parents of St Thérèse of Lisieux.”Of particular interest to Marie-Dominique is the friendship between Pauline and the Curé of Ars. As the daughter of Antoine Jaricot—a silk merchant who became a landowner in Tassin—Pauline met John Vianney, who was a regular visitor at the family home.

“Her father, Antoine, had become wealthy after the Revolution through silk and other businesses,” Marie-Dominique said. “With this money, he had bought properties, particularly in Tassin, where John Vianney—who was not yet the Curé of Ars but a young priest—was living.”

A deep spiritual friendship quickly developed between the two with the young priest struck by the enthusiasm of the young laywoman. He would later say of Pauline’s purse that it was ‘a gateway’ through which money reached the poor. Marie-Dominique interpreted this generosity as a prophetic feminine force in a rather unfavourable context.

“There is something else in Pauline’s life that touches me,” she said. “She was viewed very poorly by some of the gentlemen of Fourvière. She was unfairly judged. I, too, like many women, have experienced that kind of scrutiny, and I think Pauline can be a role model and a source of support. She was a strong young woman in a time when women were not valued. Pauline’s era was difficult and she suffered from the lack of recognition, but she persevered in her mission and her desire to help, guided by her faith.”

In the bright light of Pauline’s room, the death mask rests on a shelf alongside the cross given to her by the Curé of Ars. Without much fuss, Marie-Dominique testifies that the most precious gift Pauline passed on to her was that of a simple faith.

“For me, faith is precious, especially in difficult times,” Marie-Dominique concluded. “You do not feel alone. You are always a little alone with yourself, married or not, but you are not abandoned. Faith can also come in times of trial. In my parish in the Perche region, there are not enough of us to pray the Living Rosary, but I say two decades of the Rosary when I close the church.”

The fruitfulness of a society also, and perhaps above all, comes from these small gestures, signs of a silent and profound faithfulness.

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