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Father Leon John Dehon, SCJ

          At the age of 33, Father Dehon found all of life smiling on him:  his ministries were a success, the bishop held him in high esteem, and everyone in the city was warm and friendly to him.  But he was not happy.  His many youth programs together with his regular duties at the parish exacted a toll on his spiritual life.  The “busy-ness” of his public ministries left him little time to deepen his personal relationship with the One to whom he had dedicated his life.  He thought again about joining a religious order as a way to strengthen his union with the Lord, but as soon as this idea surfaced it hit up against the hard reality that no one was available to carry on his new ministries.  If he abandoned them, he would be abandoning the flock he had so carefully nurtured.  It seemed that his dream of spreading the love of Christ to others was coming into conflict with his original dream of giving himself over completely to the love of God.            

          He  discussed his dilemma with the bishop, who proved to be sympathetic and offered him a way to resolve the matter:  he would allow Father Dehon to establish his own religious congregation if, in turn, Father Dehon would also establish a Catholic high school in the city.  At first it might appear that this “solution” only added to the problem, but in the end it worked to everybody’s satisfaction:  the bishop would get his high school, Father Dehon would be able to live his life as a religious, and the new congregation he was founding would care for the ministries he had already established. 

                In July, 1877, Father Dehon simultaneously began a new high school and entered into a year of intense preparation to give shape and direction to his new religious congregation.  The following June he made his first vows and his religious congregation, modeled after the love of the Heart of Jesus, became the new means for him to realize his dream of uniting himself to the love of God while sharing that love with others.  

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