Very dear Brethren,

We desire to make you acquainted with the very distinguished favor which the Holy Father has just bestowed upon one of our most cherished and interesting associations; namely, the Confraternity of the Holy Face. By a brief dated the 1^st October 1885, Leo XIII, at our request, has deigned to raise to the dignity of an Archconfraternity, throughout the whole Church, the diocesan association known under the name of the Confraternity of the Holy Face. You will at once understand the high importance of this solemn act and the great development which it will obtain in the future for our association, now that it has been thus blest and glorified. Our first duty is that of gratitude towards God and the successor of Saint Peter. We eagerly seize upon this opportunity in order to recall to your remembrance the spirit and the excellence of the devotion to the Holy Face, of which Tours is henceforth, after Rome, the principal seat.

I. This form of worship rendered to Jesus Christ, you know, very dear brethren, is not new in the Church. It is attached to the dogma of the Incarnation, it dates back to the advent of the Son of God in the world. The first persons who contemplated and adored the divine Face of Jesus were Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, the magi, the disciples, and the apostles. When the people, suspended from the lips of the Man-God, admired the wisdom of his doctrine and said: “How came this man by all these things (1)?” they were, at the same time, impressed by the incomparable charms of his eloquence, the grace of his teaching, the accent of his voice, and, above all, by the aspect of his adorable Face, “upon which, says St Jerome, shine the rays of divine majesty (2).» For this Face, according to the learned and pious Origen, being turn by turn sweet and severe, merciful and terrible, assumed different aspects according to the interior dispositions of those who were in its presence; it wore an expression of benignity and tenderness towards the little children, but it terrified the sellers in the Temple. The glories of Tabor, the dolours of the Passion, reflected upon the divine Face, have been at all times the ravishing object and the subject of contemplation of noble hearts and of elect souls, such as the Augustines and the Bernards, the Gertrudes and the Mechtildes. The sublime act of a holy woman, wiping with her veil the Holy Face of Jesus, bowed beneath the weight of His cross on the path of Calvary, has always been famous; it has inspired painters and artists, and it forms the subject of the 6^th station of the Way of the Cross, reproduced under so many touching forms.

It would take too long to enumerate the riches of science and of piety which the Scriptures, the Fathers, tradition, theology and history, offer to us in favor of the worship so legitimately due to the Face of our beloved Re­deem­er. Let it suffice us to remark that Ibis sacred worship is preserved by an un­inter­rupted tradition, and from time immemorial has been practiced publicly in the basilica of Saint Peter at the Vatican; it is also well known with what jealous care, the Pontiffs, from age to age, have watchfully guarded the veil of Veronica, which the Eternal city still esteems as one of its most precious treasures.

II. Struck by these considerations, a pious Christian, belonging to our city of Tours, conceived, in 1851, the idea, into which enlightened priests and many fervent souls soon entered, of applying the worship of the sorrowful Face of Jesus Christ to the reparation of blasphemies, of infidelity and of other forms of impiety which are the grief and dishonor of the age in which we live. The ever increasing progress of skepticism, the ravages occasioned by evil doctrines, the destructive projects of secret societies have contributed to revive and to extend more and more amongst us the sense and the need of expiation, and, consequently, the salutary worship in question.

Let the world but turn towards the Face of the Christ, let it but read therein the divine teachings It gives us, let it meditate upon the lessons It presents to us, and it will quickly acquire the knowledge of its errors, it will repent on discovering in the features of the suffering Jesus, in the wounded and outraged Face of the Savior, at once His love and the precursory signs of His justice. The Holy Face, which will render it sensible of the wrong it has done and which will make it understand its offences, will inspire it with compunction of heart. The faithful will then offer to God the homage of their faith and the tribute of their reparations.

At the present day, God is everywhere forgotten; He is often denied and blasphemed. By how many crimes is not his anger provoked! His sovereignty, His authority over families and over nations, His providence, each one of His essential perfections is misunderstood and shamefully trodden under foot by an impious sect which desires to annihilate His very name, which it no longer pronounces and which it banishes even from the lips of little children. The person of Jesus Christ, His life, the ineffable countenance of the Incarnate Word, our deliverer and our Savior, the overliving summary of the Redemption, the mirror which reflects it in all its entirety, what is it for the majority of men? A cold historical souvenir, sometimes a myth, always a troublesome reproach. Hence it arises that Christ is insulted, that He is outraged, that His Name is shamefully scoffed at as in the days of the Jews who crucified Him. When the crucifix and the pictures of Saints are removed from schools, is it not because of a desire to efface the celestial impression of the adorable Face of Jesus, engraved by Christian mothers in the hearts of their children?

What remedy can be applied to so great an evil? How can the battle best be fought, at one time against such ignorance, at another against such forgetfulness, at yet another against such outrages? From the very beginning of Christianity the great apostle who made the light of the gospel to shine forth in the midst of the darkness of paganism pointed out the remedy. The goodness and kindness of God our Savior has appeared, he exclaimed: Benignitas el humanitas apparuit salvatoris nostri Dei (3). At the present day, in these our wretched times, in which a species of paganism, worse than the ancient, has shown itself, behold this luminous Face, at once divine and human, of our God Savior is presented to us. Already it has suffered for love of us the ignominies and the wounds of the Passion; now, a powerful advocate in Heaven, it pleads our cause before its Father; at the altar, in the sacrament of the Eucharist, although hidden and invisible, it is really present, looks at us, smiles at us, blesses us and protects us. Let us turn towards it with confidence; let us picture it to ourselves, let us question its divine physiognomy; let us show it under all its different aspects to the heavenly Father, irritated by our offences. “O God! look on the Face of thy Christ… Father, forgive:” Respice in Faciem Christi tui (4)… Pater, dimitte (5). Let us present it to men, to sinners, to those who curse and outrage it; its tears, its sweat, its unalterable patience, its invincible love, possess the power of disarming the most rebellious and touching the most hardened; in its presence, we trust, they will fall on their knees, and will strike their breasts, and will return to the knowledge and the love of their God.

Such is, in fact, the aim of the devotion to the Holy Face: to touch the heart of man, to arrest the arm of God. And what efficacity must it not possess in order to attain this twofold and so desirable object? It renders sensible to us all that is most touching and most penetrating in the adorable person of the Incarnate Word; of Him whom the prophets styled at once “the man of sorrows”, and “the most beautiful among the children of men”. It shows him to us under the most merciful and the most amiable of his aspects. It is by the countenance, say the Scriptures, that man is discerned and makes himself known (6). In our Lord, who possessed our human nature in all its perfection, his Holy Face was the most pure mirror of his soul, the vivid and sweet expansion of his heart, the visible expression of his intimate thoughts and of his most tender affections. Thus, the worship of his divine Face, although it is distinct and special, is intimately attached to the devotion to the Eucharist, and to that of the Passion. Without being confounded with these great devotions, which are so eminently catholic and so strongly recommended, it lends them a useful aid; it completes them, illuminates them, tends to render them, at least in the case of many souls, more sensible, more attractive and more fruitful; by them, and in union with them, it helps fervent souls to enter more easily into meditation on the mysteries and the love of our Lord; it thus disposes the faithful to the most generous and the most heroic acts of penitence and reparation.

III. These considerations, which we have only lightly touched upon and which it is not necessary to enter into more deeply, had struck us for a long time past, my very dear brethren; and they determined us to establish in the chapel of the Holy Face a special Confraternity, distinct from all those already existing, and having statutes of its own. Making use of our power as Ordinary, we realised this our idea by means of an ordinance dated the 25^th of October 1884, and we canonically established in our archiepiscopal city a Con­fraternity of the Holy Face, properly so called.

On two different occasions the new Confraternity presented itself at Rome before the Holy Father, in order that he might condescend to bless it, to approve it and to enrich it with indulgences. His Holiness deigned to do so: the first time, by a Brief dated the 9^th of December 1884, and a second time, by another Brief dated the 30^th March 1885. Lastly, quite recently, by a third Brief dated the 1^st October of the present year, crowning all his previous favours, acquiescing with singular benevolence in the humble request which had been addressed to him on the subject, our Holy Father, Pope Leo XIII, declared that he had raised the Confraternity of the Holy Face to the rank of an Archconfraternity, and together with this title had conferred upon it the preeminence, the rights and all the privileges attached to the title. The intention of His Holiness is that there should be no restriction and no limit assigned to it; it is in perpetuity and for all the countries of the world, wherever they may be, ubique terrarum, he also grants to the said Archconfraternity, the power of aggregating to itself other associations of the same kind and of communicating to them the privileges it enjoys itself, as well as the indulgences and other spiritual favors with which it has already been, or may hereafter be enriched. This concession is the largest of any which, in similar matters, it is possible to obtain from the Holy See.

We confess, very dear brethren, that we most certainly neglected nothing in order to sustain and strengthen the petition presented to the Holy Father. Nevertheless a success so prompt and so complete has overpassed all that we expected; it can only be explained, so we are told from Rome, by an unexpected intervention of divine Providence, and by the express will of Leo XIII, arising from his desire to obtain a compensation for the trials he has suffered and which have touched him deeply.

Our gratitude is therefore equal to our admiration and our joy. You will partake it, very dear brethren; in the presence of God, you will share in the sentiments with which we are filled towards the august and well-beloved Pontiff who has given us a new and touching mark of the paternal interest he takes in our metropolitan church. For you understand that the honor done to the Oratory of the Holy Face is reflected upon our archiepiscopal city and upon the whole of our diocese. We have now, in our midst, at a few steps from the ancient tomb of our great miracle worker, a new center of divine love, a center of adoration and of acts of reparation, recognized and authorized by the Vicar of Jesus Christ, enriched by him with exceptional distinctions and precious indulgences. The modest sanctuary, in which during twenty five years he prayed, whom the popular voice styled the holy man of Tours, had already attracted the attention of France and of the most distant countries; pilgrims continually flocked thither, singly or in groups, from different countries. At the present day, the finger of the Sovereign Pontiff itself points out this holy place to the whole Church, and assigns it, during all coming centuries, a place apart, amongst those which are the most favored of such resorts. Towards this spot will henceforth turn in full assurance, from all parts of the world, the eyes and hearts of those who desire to venerate the sorrowful Face of Christ, and in it to find a means of preservation and salvation. Show us thy Face, o Lord, and we shall be saved (7). This suppliant cry of the Prophet king, issuing from the Oratory where Mr. Dupont so often uttered it, in the recollection and the fervor of prayer, will be reechoed from the farthest extremities of the universe, the benign words of the Sovereign Pontiff will accompany it, and guarantee its salutary effect.

IV. We are touched, very dear brethren, we thrill with joy at this thought; salvation may come, or at least it may be powerfully helped on by the Holy Face! and it is in our midst that the worship of it has been specially blest by Leo XIII! How would it be possible for our heart not to be filled with consolation and hope? How, in this characteristic of an amiable Providence, would it be possible for us not to see a great blessing granted to our episcopate? The association which was necessarily endued with an isolated and restricted character finds itself aggrandized and confirmed by a memorable act of the Sovereign Pontiff. By decorating it with the title and the honor of an Archconfraternity, possessing the power of affiliation throughout the whole world, Leo XIII gives to the devotion of the Holy Face a principle of vitality and expansion, which it did not hitherto enjoy; a kind of apostolic sanction which renders it worthy of being recommended to the pastors and the faithful of the universal Church.

For the sake of these motives, very dear brethren, we exhort you to enter, as far as shall be possible to you, into so generous and opportune intentions. Let us honor, let us more than ever love the Holy Face of our Lord; let us offer it a frequent homage of praise and reparation. Hasten to solicit your admission amongst the associates of the Archconfraternity; it is for us to be the first to give an example of eagerness and zeal; to profit by the graces of which we here possess the center and the source. Those amongst the clergy who may judge it expedient to establish the association in their parish churches will readily obtain from us all the necessary authorizations. At their request we will deliver to them an ordinance of establishment which will permit them to receive, from the director of the Archconfraternity, a diploma of aggregation, giving a right to the indulgences and other spiritual favors.

We leave to the director of the Holy Face the duty of notifying the series of indulgences, plenary and partial, imprinted upon leaflets, which we authorize him to diffuse, together with the Rule approved by us, and the last most important Brief received from the Holy Father.

We have reason to hope that our venerable colleagues of the episcopate in France will have it at heart to favor, to the utmost of their power, in their respective dioceses, the establishment and diffusion of the new Archconfraternity, which we know a great number of them have already done with the happiest results and with abundant and consoling fruit for souls.

Our desires and our hopes go farther still. Thanks to the pontifical munificence and to the extension of the powers granted to the director of the Archconfraternity, the devotion to the Holy Face, will, we have no doubt, be propagated more and more amongst the most distant foreign nations, and as the religious needs of the present day are nearly everywhere the same, we believe our dear Archconfraternity called upon to produce in every place, a holy emulation of zeal for the honour of Jesus Christ, and the triumph of his Church, avast and unanimous concert of fervent reparatory prayers, which will embrace the whole world, and which God will deign to recompense by the results which are the most conformable to the desires of his Vicar upon earth.

The present pastoral letter shall be read from the pulpit on the Sunday following its reception.

Given at Tours, in our archiepiscopal palace, on the 15^th October 1885, the day of the feast of S^t Theresa.

† Guillaume-Rene,
Archbishop of Tours.

(1) Mark, VI, 2.

(2) Divinalis majestas lucebat in facie. (S. Hieron. in Math., III, 106.)

(3) Tit. in, 4.

(4) Ps. LXXXIII, 10.

(5) Luc, XXIII, 34.

(6) Ex visu cognoscitur vir. (Eccle., xix, 26.)

(7) Domine, ostende Faciem tuam, et salvi erimus. (Ps LXXIX, 4.) The Holy Father grants sixty days of indulgence to those who recite these words and devoutly kiss a picture of the Holy Face.