Lest You Remain

Consecrated to God Drawn by the love God, John Papczy < ski determined to consecrate everything to Him. His final decision to join a religious community was made at the age of 23, although he probably thought about it several years before. He had behind him a troubled academic path, grave illnesses, hunger, poverty and distance from his fam- ily home. Overcoming these obstacles he could finally look with hope to the future. His academic achievements (completion of high school and philosophy) assured him employment and position; they presaged a happy and secure life. His family found him a promising bride, reckoning that after years of studies and wandering in the world he would finally find peace in a family nest. He, however, decided to consecrate himself to God’s service on the path of religious life. Father Papczy < ski’s later works and decisions showed that he envisaged the religious life as the most perfect way of realizing the Gospel life. He desired to live the evangelical ideal, so as to imitate Jesus and Mary. During his youth he had the possibility of closely knowing two religious orders, from which he obtained his education—the Jesuits and Piarists. He chose the latter, less known in the Church, in addition, undergoing at that time some sort of an inner crisis. From 1646 by a decision of the Holy See religious vows could not be professed within the Piarist order. This most probably influenced John so that he did not join a religious order earlier, waiting for the overturn of the prohibition of the right to make religious vows in the Piarists. This community, whose goal was to educate the spiritually neglected and poor youngsters, was to give witness to poverty and piety, he called in his later writings; the most holy Congregation of Pious Schools, more precious than life itself this Congregation of Pious Schools, the most beloved Association of the Poor of Our Lady ( Fundatio domus recollectionis ), and he desired to remain therein until the end of his life. Being invested with the Piarists’ habit, he received the religious name of Stanislaus of Jesus Mary. This name was mirrored in his life. The new patron of Fr. Papczy<ski was the holy Krakowian bishop Stanislaus—a martyr for the faith and freedom of the Church, an uncompromising defender of evangelical values. Consciously Fr. Papczy < ski entered the course of defending values and often put it before his personal life. The prefix “of Jesus Mary” in his religious name would resonate in his love for the Crucified Christ and Mary Immaculately Conceived. From the beginning of his life in the Piarist order, Stanislaus Papczy < ski gave himself whole-heartedly in fulfilling of his vocation. In 1675, (that is four years after he left the Piarists), when writing about his life in the Congregation of Pious Schools, Fr. Stanislaus admitted: “I greatly cherished my religious vocation that came from nowhere else but God Himself” ( Fundation domus recollectionis ). He L EST Y OU R EMAIN W ITHOUT W ORK IN THE V INEYARD OF THE L ORD 76