There are a lot of famous Jesuit saints, many of whom you know by just one name: Ignatius, Xavier, Canisius, Gonzaga, the list goes on. But there are countless holy Jesuits (and other Ignatian-inspired women and men of faith) whose incredible stories aren’t as well-known. Despite their lower profiles, their lives of heroic virtue can inspire us today as we seek to follow Christ more closely. So we asked the writer Meg Hunter-Kilmer to introduce us to 10 of these “friends of Ignatius.”
Hunter-Kilmer is a renowned American Catholic writer whose work on saints has been featured in her books “Saints Around the World” and “Pray for Us: 75 Saints Who Sinned, Suffered, and Struggled on Their Way to Holiness.” She picked 10 women and men from the wide Ignatian family whose causes for sainthood have officially been opened.
Each essay in this series, which will run monthly, is accompanied by an original artwork of the featured friend of Ignatius.
St. Noël Chabanel
St. Noël Chabanel was a failure. Despite being talented and intelligent, he was a famously ineffective missionary with a deep distaste for the life and customs of the people he served. He couldn’t learn their language, which made preaching the Gospel impossible. He had every reason to give up, to return to France where he could accomplish great things.
But God had called him to Canada, and in Canada he would stay. And so he stayed and failed and died — and thus won a martyr’s crown and a place in the canon of saints.
Chabanel had an ordinary childhood, then followed in the footsteps of his older brother when he entered the Society of Jesus. As a young Jesuit, Chabanel was a college rhetoric professor at the age of 19. He served in that position for seven years before resuming his studies in order to be ordained. His superiors at the time described him thus: “Serious by nature, energetic, great stability, better than average intelligence.”
But though Fr. Chabanel was successful in his native France, he longed to preach the Gospel to people who had never heard it. Even before his ordination, he had written for permission to cut his studies short in order to leave for the missions of Canada. After his ordination, a second entreaty was successful; in 1643 Fr. Chabanel sailed for Canada; with his rumored talent for languages, he was expected to be a great success.
After a journey of three months, Fr. Chabanel and his companions arrived in Quebec, where they spent the winter preparing for a treacherous journey to Huronia. During that time, Fr. Chabanel must have dreamed of how he would preach to the people to whom God had called him.
But try as he might, he couldn’t learn a word of Huron. And he did try — for years. But despite his best efforts, he was a failure. His superior, Fr. Paul Ragueneau, SJ, described the situation:
“Once here, even after three, four, five years of study of the [Indigenous] language, he made such little progress that he could hardly be understood even in the most ordinary conversation. This was no small mortification for a man burning with the desire to convert [the Indigenous]. Besides, it was particularly painful, for his memory had always been good, as were his other talents, which was proven by his years of satisfactory teaching of rhetoric in France.”
Years of effort had resulted in a priest who could dispense sacraments but not preach, who could baptize but not evangelize. Of what use was a missionary priest who could serve only the already converted? A priest who was ridiculed and taunted by his flock because of his miserably inadequate language skills?
In moments of minor inconvenience or total desolation, St. Noël Chabanel teaches us to cling to Jesus; that’s what makes saints.
Worse, Fr. Chabanel soon discovered that his initial culture shock would never wear off. He couldn’t stand the noise or the smoke or the lack of privacy. Despite his best efforts, he was revolted by every element of Huron culture: food, clothing, housing, everything. It was all just too different from what he was accustomed to, and he simply couldn’t adjust.
He was a failure. He was uncomfortable and frustrated and alone. And on top of all that (perhaps in part because of all that) God felt distant as well. His superior writes of spiritual darkness endured by Fr. Chabanel:
“When, in addition, God withdraws his visible graces and remains hidden, although a person sighs for him alone, and when he leaves the soul a prey to sadness, disgust and natural aversions — these are the trials which are greater than ordinary virtue can bear. The love of God has to be strong in the heart not to be snuffed out under such circumstances.”
By God’s grace, this love was strong in Fr. Chabanel’s heart. Whatever he felt, he trusted in God’s goodness and in the will of his superiors. And so, rather than demanding a new assignment or insisting that the Hurons accommodate him by speaking his language and cooking the food he was accustomed to, Fr. Chabanel chose to die to himself a hundred times each day, writing of himself that he was a “bloodless martyr in the shadow of martyrdom.”
This bloodless martyr would soon shed his blood. But until then, he would stay where he was: useless, even a burden. He would live as his people lived, eat what they ate. He would celebrate Mass. He would be grateful for the Hurons’ hospitality and embrace their culture, however hard it was for him. He would love them, even if that love seemed to accomplish nothing. After wrestling with his own shame and inadequacy for nearly three years, after fighting the inclination to flee again and again, Fr. Chabanel made a vow: Whatever happened, he would not leave the Hurons. On June 20, 1647 (the Feast of Corpus Christi), he wrote:
“My Lord, Jesus Christ, who, by the admirable dispositions of Divine Providence, hast willed that I should be a helper of the holy apostles of this Huron vineyard, entirely unworthy though I be, drawn by the desire to cooperate with the designs which the Holy Ghost has upon me for the conversion of these Hurons to the faith; I, Noel Chabanel, in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament of your Sacred Body and Most Precious Blood, which is the Testament of God with man; I vow perpetual stability in this Huron Mission; it being understood that all this is subject to the dictates of the Superiors of the Society of Jesus, who may dispose of me as they wish. I pray, then, O Lord, that You will deign to accept me as a permanent servant in this mission and that You will render me worthy of so sublime a ministry. Amen.”
Though he embraced his bloodless martyrdom, Fr. Chabanel still pined after the glorious martyrdom so many of his Jesuit brothers were suffering. But even here he was a failure. He was called away from the missions of St. Ignace and St Louis; a month later, Sts. Jean de Brebeuf and Gabriel Lalemant were martyred there. Later that year, Fr. Chabanel was called away from the Mission of St. Jean; only two days later, St. Charles Garnier was killed there. Once again, he felt he had missed his chance.
But Fr. Chabanel remained faithful. Though God seemed distant and success impossible, though his life was unpleasant and his work fruitless, he clung to the cross and committed himself again to the God who loved him. And the God who loved him — who had always been close to him, who had always been working — would reward him with the crown of martyrdom. The very next day, word came that the Iroquois were on their way. When Fr. Chabanel fled with his people, he was unable to keep up. He sent them on ahead, saying, “What difference does it make if I die or not? This life does not count for much. The Iroquois cannot snatch the happiness of heaven from me.”
In the end, it wasn’t the Iroquois who killed him but a baptized Huron man who had left the faith and resented the missionaries for the perceived bad luck that had followed his baptism. Fr. Chabanel had finally won his martyr’s crown — not just through his suffering that day but through years of being martyred before that: dying to himself, to his preferences, to his ideas of what was appropriate or pleasant or fruitful.
St. Noël Chabanel is a tremendous inspiration when your life feels like a complete failure, for the seasons when you regret all your life choices and want to run from your obligations, certain that you can never be happy in this job or this community or this family. He’s also a powerful intercessor for the moments when you feel you just can’t endure another day of unappetizing meals or uncomfortable seats or unpleasant interactions. In moments of minor inconvenience or total desolation, St. Noël Chabanel teaches us to cling to Jesus; that’s what makes saints.
