Jan Van Raemdonck

If You Exist Jan Van Raemdonck

The premature loss of both his parents made such a strong impression on the young French viscount Charles de Foucauld (1858-1916) that it distorted his whole life. His officer training was a fiasco. Finally he is discharged from the army. When his comrades are activated in war, in spite of everything he still wants to show solidarity. The silence and the space of the North African desert charm him. After his voyage of discovery in Morocco (1883 - 1884) Charles became another person: deepened... and strongly fascinated by the faith of the islamites. Marie de Bondy, his eight year older niece, supports him and Charles admires her religious example. She gets him in contact with vicar Henri Huvelin. Huvelin is a man of deed, and already at a first meeting he asks Charles to convert, with results. Marie de Bondy and vicar Huvelin will always support Charles. A few years after his conversion, he entered a Trappist abbey. However, this life did not satisfy him and from 1897 to 1900 he followed the working life of Joseph and Mary in Nazareth and during periods in Jerusalem. Always restless, he continued his search; back to the Muslims in Algeria: in Beni-Abbes and later in Tamanrasset, where he was murdered on December 1, 1916. An eccentric vocation story, mainly studied from a psychological and religious point of view. Mgr. Paul Schruers, former bishop of Hasselt, wrote an Introduction. Charles de Foucauld was declared Venerable on April 24th 2001 by the Saint Pope John Paul II, then Blessed on November 13th 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI.