Page 112 - March On! God will Provide by Brother Aubert

Chapter 15

INVITATION TO ENGLAND

E e"rr oF THE EARLv yr.rns of the Xaverian foundation
I_i wls a grim one, but Eighteen Forty-Seven seemed
the grimmcst of all. Sickness was rampant at .,Het Wal-
fetje," and Brother Ryken was so poverty-stricken that
he could do none of the little thingl that ire loved to do
for the sick, There were several days that year when
he could not have uncovered one centime in'the whole
house.
- He could have put an embargo on new candidates,
but he did not. In the course of-the year fourteen ne\o
names were added to rhe Register. Some o{ the arrivals
taried only briefly, brrt eight of them remained long
enough to be clothed in the habit, and three of them-I
Peter Klyberg, Martin Hahnel, and Mark De Vries-
died as Xaverians.
r-.ike practically everybody else in Flanders, Brother
Ryken needed money and needed it desperately,. but
there was no one to whom he could turn. in the'previ-
ous he had been bold enough to make an aiipeal
_year
tg ,h...Congregation of propaganda in Rome, fe1*ing
that his was a missionary orginization in need of ai-
sistance.
So critical was the economic plight in Flanders that
everyone not in dire need was worried over what the
morrow might In East Flanders every fourth
-b1ing.
person was receivin$ public aid; in West Flanders every
third.person. ':This meanJ that adding those helped
by p_rivate charities one half of the Fledish population
was living on alms."