Thread by @PapalZouaveInt

On the Solemnity of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception 157 years ago, Papal Zouave Lieutenant Theodore Wibaux was inducted into the Papal Zouaves🇻🇦

Filled with excitement about officially joining on this great feast day he wrote to his parents🧵

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"At last I have put on the uniform of a soldier of Christ, and have fully entered on the path of sacrifice. God be thanked for having in His mercy chosen me to be one of the defenders of His Church! And I thank you too, my dear parents, for having turned a deaf ear to what

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the world said, and listened only to the voice of God. As for me, natural affection often speaks only too audibly to my heart, especially during the last 3 days, when I think that now the sea rolls between us, and I may perhaps never see you again, I feel quite heart-broken

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But above and beyond all this there is devotion to the Holy Father, and the consciousness of having done one's duty. Who would ever have dreamt of Theodore being a soldier! I can hardly believe in my own identity as I march about with a sword at my side,

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or a heavy rifle in my hands. I tell myself I am not a soldier, but a son of Pius IX. I am obliged to repeat this to myself over and over again, for I always felt an aversion to military life. Still I am not destitute of interior happiness, far from it,

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indeed I some times am tempted to exclaim aloud: Welcome suffering, since it is for Jesus Christ! And if the natural man has to make many bitter experiences, the spiritual man enjoys true content." 6/6

Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception,
Ora pro nobis!🇻🇦

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