16 Martyrs of Compiègne Followed the Lamb to the Guillotine — and to Glory| National Catholic Register
On July 17, 1794, Madame Lidoine, prioress of the Carmel of Compiègne (in religion called Mother Teresa of St. Augustine) stood with her 15 Carmelite daughters in the Place du Trône Renversé in Paris at the height of the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution and led them as they renewed their religious vows in unison.
The putrid smell of human blood filled the humid air as a silent throng watched, amazed to hear religious vows pronounced in public — a practice suppressed by the new French Republic. Madame Lidoine inclined her ear toward the youngest in the community, 29-year-old Constance, whom today Madame had allowed to make her Final Profession of Vows. But oh, how different this milestone was for dear Constance. For unlike the usual ritual of a Final Profession when, preceding her vows, a novice prostrates face-down in the form of a cross on the choir floor while the community intones the Litany of Saints, today Madame Lidoine knew that the newly professed would, indeed, lie face-down, but toward the immediate and stark yet glorious fulfillment of her sacred promise.
The vows complete, Constance approached and knelt at Madame’s feet according to the Carmelite custom of obedience to God through one’s superior. “Permission to die, Mother?” The time had come. Nodding, Madame opened her palm and revealed a tiny clay statue of the Virgin Mary. “Yes, go my daughter!” Gently kissing Mary’s image, Constance then stood, turned to the guillotine, and startled everyone as she burst into praise of God, singing Psalm 117 as she waved aside the assistance of the executioner and his valet and strode like a champion to the top of the scaffold steps and placed her face against the horizontal wooden plank as she continued to sing, “His mercy endures forever!”
As the executioner tightened the strap around Constance, Madame Lidoine felt as if her heart had been pierced as he tipped the plank forward to a vertical position, secured Constance’s neck in the neck stall, and then released the cord of the massive triangular blade above, letting it plunge to its mark with deadly precision. “For His mercy endures forever!” the sisters continued their sung prayer as one by one they knelt with courage at Madame Lidoine’s feet in preparation for the same bloody ritual. Not to satisfy the designs of the dark, secular forces at play, intent on destroying the Catholic Church, but in fidelity to a special vow they had made: to offer themselves, in union with Jesus, the Lamb of God, as an expiatory sacrifice of love to the Father to end the violence and restore the practice of Christianity in their beloved country.
More in-depth details about the martyrdom of the Carmelites are contained in To Quell the Terror by William Bush. The book highlights the role of Madame Lidoine, whom the author calls “the true mother of the martyrdom of the sixteen Carmelites.” He writes, “The mystery of their vocation was, indeed, to be made incarnate in her.”
Madame Lidoine first sensed “the mystery” as a prophetic call in 1789. She was 34 and had just become prioress. The moment came while reading an account written by a member of the community during the previous century. In it, the visionary described a “mystic dream” in which she was visited by heavenly personages, including St. Teresa of Ávila and previous leaders of the Carmel of Compiègne. She saw angels placing members of the community in different levels of heaven, and at a higher level, saw “a Lamb who looked at us all very lovingly.”
Some members of the community, she wrote, passed into an unknown place, and these, she understood, “were not to follow the Lamb.” Madame paused, feeling she was one of those chosen “to follow the Lamb.” But it was not until 1792 that she shared the “mystic dream” with her daughters and her decision to make a special vow, promising, if God willed it, “to follow the Lamb” even unto death by execution. She left each sister free to choose whether to join her in the vow or not.
By then the monarchy had fallen, pagan rituals were rampant, religious vows had been suppressed, and priests were ordered to sign the “Civil Constitution of the Clergy,” promising obeyance to the French Republic, effectively rejecting papal authority. Non-compliant priests were expelled from the country or massacred. Now, following Madame’s revelation to her daughters, monasteries were closed and ordered to separate into small “associations,” each group housed in separate locations in the homes of friends. The wearing of religious habits was forbidden, leaving Madame to beg the charity of friends whose only dresses included revealing necklines. As a remedy, Madame procured scarves for coverage and to protect the nuns’ vow of chastity.
It was her strong leadership and encouragement that kept the community united. She located housing for each association close to one another, and cared for the elderly, two of whom died during this time. Each morning, she gathered her daughters together for Mass at a church to pray and renew their special vow. Although most had chosen to join her in the vow, two sisters left to care for their parents. Now 16 remained, determined “to follow the Lamb” wherever he would lead.
Determination was needed. For on June 21, 1794, each association was raided by agents of the Committee of Surveillance who scoured the premises in search of evidence to bring the “traitors” to trial. Claiming “highly incriminating evidence,” the ruffians returned the next day and transported the community to the vacated Visitation convent, now used as a prison. Under surveillance for two weeks, it was only upon Madame Lidoine’s fervent request that the guard allowed his prisoners to wash their clothing and to don their religious habits while the clothes dried.
This, no doubt, was an act of Providence. For as the civilian clothes lay, soaking in tubs, the mayor of Compiègne and two gendarmes burst into the room, under strict orders to transport the “traitors” immediately to trial before the Revolutionary Tribunal at the Conciergerie. Although the mayor, at first, terrified of being seen transporting “traitors” in habit, ordered them to change back into the wet clothing, he then relented, seized with fear of being disciplined by the judge for arriving late at trial. With that, the community, as dressed, was led outside into open carts where they endured the exhaustive two-day journey to Paris, followed by two more bleak nights behind bars in the subterranean bowels of the Conciergerie prison.
The next day, July 17, though weak from hunger, the nuns stood, unabashed before the hateful glares of all present in the courtroom, clothed in habit, minus veils covering their heads. Instead, their closely-cropped hair was covered by white caps, which were sewn in advance by Madame Lidoine, who anticipated the likely executions to come. The executioner, she knew, manhandled victims as he cut hair and clothing away from necks to prepare for the blade. It is not unlikely to imagine, then, that as Madame plied her sewing needle from one stitch to the next, she prayed to Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and asked, “Please, may these caps at least spare your daughters the touch of his brutish hands.”
But the community was not to be spared the next events at trial, beginning with the absurd list of charges against them, including, “As for the ex-Carmelite nuns, Lidoine, Touret, Brare, Dufour and the rest, though separated by their dwellings, they nonetheless organized meetings and counterrevolutionary cells amongst themselves and others, whom they gathered together, and were reviving their esprit de corps.” As well, the nuns were accused of intriguing against the Revolution, and of having in their possession letters from a “foreign or immigrated priest” that contained “fanatical and childish” images, a reference to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Finally, although Madame attempted to defend the innocence of her daughters, crying out, “Let me die, not them!” she was silenced as the judge handed down what had already been decided as the pre-determined verdict: “The Tribunal, after having heard the Public Prosecutor’s conclusions of the application of the law, condemns to death all those named in the declaration of the jury cited.”
In that instant, Madame understood that she or any of her daughters could have cowered and reneged on their special vow out of natural fear. Instead, each sister was suddenly filled with supernatural peace, unafraid and renewed in their resolve “to follow the Lamb” to the cross. As the Epistle to the Hebrews described Jesus during his passion and crucifixion, “For the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, heedless of its shame” (Hebrews 12:2).
The community sang as they were loaded into tumbrels — the open carts used during executions — and paraded for three hours through the streets of Paris to the guillotine. Their song included the Miserere, the Office of Readings, the Salve Regina, and the Office of the Dead for all those who had gone before them. The silence of the spectators, it was noted, was unprecedented, perhaps inspired by the beauty of the song heard, as well as the joy on the nuns’ faces, reminders of days not so long ago when God had been loved and worshipped in their country in peace. Could the same ever be true again?
As a sign of hope and of the fruit of their sacrifice, within only a few days of the martyrdom of the Carmelites, the Reign of Terror ended. Now, in this Easter season, it is lovely to realize that Madame Lidoine and her daughters are continuing to intercede on our behalf and reminding us to celebrate the truth of Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life: “Salvation comes from our God, who is seated on the throne, and from the Lamb” (Revelation 7:10).
Amen. Alleluia!
