– Marie-Paule –
Some of Raoul Auclair’s friends heard him speak
of the moment of grace he experienced one day in Marseille,
and they have mentioned it in the paper
"Le Royaume".
It was Marseille, October 9, 1941, and it was eleven minutes past nine in the morning. Suddenly there was like a lightning stroke: in an instant his entire being was as if it were afire. He felt, as it were, the fire of God; he was as though immersed in God, immersed in eternity, hence outside of time. In that flash of lightning in which he was in God, there was what seemed an incredible irruption into him of things inexpressible. Then it was all over and he returned to a consciousness of reality and time as abruptly as he had exited them. |
 Panoramic view of Marseille |
He had just experienced something beyond words. Then behold, three days later, October 12, there was a second enkindling. All that he could think was that he had complete knowledge. It was 1:25 p.m. He kept his secret to himself for years, not speaking of it even to his wife. He looked upon that illumination he had received as a potential explosion contained within him.
Some years later he became interested in the life of Saint Hildegard, and he had the suprise of his life, for he was not yet able to explain what had happened to him at Marseille – that coming on fire, that immersion in eternity. Here is what was revealed by Saint Hildegard, who lived in the 12th century: "At the age of 42 years and 7 months, a light and a dazzling flash, coming from a partially open heaven, penetrated the whole of my spirit, the whole of my heart, the whole of my being... And all at once I had an understanding of the Psalms, the Gospels and the other Catholic books, both from the Old and the New Testaments." In an instant, she had the knowledge!
As of that day of illumination Raoul began writing Le Livre des Cycles (first volume), accomplishing this at one stretch – 144 chapters –, the whole being done without any planning or research. It merited him the first prize in literature. The second volume of the Cycles and the other works which followed were written in the same fashion. The first book contained in embryo all that he later wrote.
He had many talents, passing from architecture to radio broadcasting as author, then as producer, director, etc.
Once he fled to Châteauneuf-de-Galaure, arriving at the right time to make a retreat that would mark him for life. The Mass began with the general intentions, and the first stunned him: "Let us pray," the preacher said, "for those who see in history the finger of God." It made Raoul start. He followed the entire retreat – a salutary balm to the suffering that had led him to that place. Following an afternoon of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, and with the other retreatants,he made, "with a zeal that was total and absolute", his act of consecration following the formula of Saint Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort.
After that time, the love he pledged to Mary quenched the cravings of his youth, and the Madonna made of him an apostle of multiple human resources which served her cause, sometimes in the light, sometimes in obscurity, with the same passion the cross had stilled, allowing the power of the Spirit to increase tenfold in his translucent spirit. Raoul gave himself to Mary with the love of a child, and he entered into her Mysteries with a joyous faith. He has departed, open to the Light in which every being lives again.
Marie-Paule
January 25, 1997
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