On 4 August, as we celebrate the feast of St John Vianney (known to the French as Jean Vianney), the patron saint of parish priests, we also celebrate National Vocations Awareness Week (2-9 August) in Australia. This is an opportunity to remember Father Julian Tenison Woods, or as St Mary MacKillop called him ‘Father Founder’ and reflect on his vocation journey.
There is a special Josephite connection on this feast day. In 1854, when twenty-one-year-old Julian was in France, studying for ordination as a member of the Marist order, he was sent on a holiday planned by his Superior and director, Father, now Saint, Peter Julian Eymard. Because of repeated illness, Julian was profoundly anxious about reaching his heart’s goal, ordination. He longed to be a missionary priest in a missionary order. Despite Fr Eymard’s expressed perception that his illness was part of God’s mysterious plan for his priesthood, Julian struggled. His anxiety peaked just before the holiday when he was walking with a friend, a recently ordained Marist priest. His friend fell in a faint beside him and died within half an hour. The shock brought on a severe cardiac reaction in Julian, who was treated with the contemporary medical cure, extensive leeching.
When sufficiently recovered, he set out on the holiday with a Marist companion. Julian was so miserable that he could enjoy nothing of the holiday. Did the death of the young friend plant a fear that he would never be ordained, that he would die before he was ordained? It triggered a visible nervousness that ended only on his journey from Adelaide to Sevenhill (South Australia) two years later, to prepare for ordination. The nervousness that Julian said brought him ‘gloom and misery’ was noticed by the clergy in Tasmania.
Fr Eymard’s itinerary for Julian included a visit to Fr John Vianney, the Parish Priest of Ars, famous through Europe and beyond for his spiritual insight. Julian wrote near the end of his life that in the holiday “the only gleam of comfort I got was a few words of advice and consolation from the Curé. He was allowed by our Lord to see many things that were sealed and mysterious to me”.
What did St John Vianney see? Did he glimpse a meeting with a young woman (Mary MacKillop) in another country? A huge number of religious Sisters? A mighty missionary impact? A man of faith among men of science? Much suffering?
It is interesting that Bishop Robert Willson, who in October 1854 invited Julian to Hobart, had also visited St John Vianney in the same year Julian visited. An intuitive, enterprising movie maker could, with artist’s licence, concertina dates and show the two men from England, the sixty-year-old Bishop and the anxious Marist student for priesthood lining up near each other for the wise words of this holy man.
Learn more about the life of Fr Julian in the book, Julian Tenison Woods: The Human Journey: Priest, Founder, Friend by Janice (Jan) Tranter rsj – available for purchase here.
Jan Tranter rsj
Sisters of St Joseph Lochinvar
Sources:
- ‘Saints in the Making of Julian Tenison Woods’, in Janice Tranter, Julian Tenison Woods, the Human Story: Priest, Founder, Friend, 2026, ATF Press, pp. 227-8
- Letter of Bishop Francis Murphy in Mother Mary of the Cross MacKillop, Julian Tenison Woods: A Life, canonisation edition, 2010, p. 27
- R.T. Southerwood, The Convicts’ Friend, (Bishop R. W. Willson), 1989, p. 153