Charles de Foucauld was born into a French aristocratic family. Orphaned at a young age, he was raised by his maternal grandfather, Colonel Beaudet de Morlet. Charles rejected the faith as a teenager and led a desolate life. He enrolled in a military academy and at the age of 22 was sent to Algeria as part of the French Army. However, his military service was short-lived, as he soon left the army and set off to explore Morocco, publishing research papers about his travels. Feeling a profound emptiness in his life, he returned to France, made his confession, and began his spiritual journey. As he himself said, “As soon as I believed there was a God, I understood that I could not do anything other than live for him alone.”
Moved by the words from the Gospel, “Go…. Sell everything…. Come,” Charles, unlike the young man in the parable, went, sold, and came – first to Trappist monasteries in France and Syria. After studying for the priesthood, he returned to the desert with the intent of founding a religious order, but no one joined him in this endeavor. In the Sahara, he would live a simple, austere life as a hermit among the nomadic Tuareg people. He wished to be an adorer in the wilderness, a brother to “the most abandoned.” He was killed by bandits on December 1, 1916.
“The Church in the world cannot grow and mature unless it is aware that its hidden roots are in the atmosphere of Nazareth. Seeking the ‘last place,’ Charles de Foucauld found Nazareth. During his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, this place had the greatest impact on him. Nazareth completely won his heart. He wanted to follow Jesus in his silence, his poverty, and his work. He literally wanted to fulfill Jesus’ words: ‘When you are invited, go and take the lowest place’ (Luke 14:10). Walking in the footsteps of ‘the mystery of Jesus’ life,’ Charles de Foucauld found the worker Jesus. It was there, in his reflection on Jesus’ life, that a new path for the Church was opened. It became the starting point for the rediscovery of the poor Church. The New Testament does not begin in the temple, nor on a holy mountain, but in the Virgin’s house, in the Worker’s home, in a forgotten place in ‘pagan Galilee,’ from which no one expected anything good.” (Benedict XVI.)
“Guided by the ideal of total surrender to God, he identified with the least, the abandoned ones in the wastelands of the African desert. In this environment, Charles de Foucauld expressed his desire to feel like a brother to every person and asked a friend: ‘Pray to God that I may truly be a brother to all souls in these regions.’ Ultimately, he wanted to be a ‘universal brother.’ But only by identifying with the least did he become the brother of all.” (Francis)