On 3 October 1999 the Flemish priest Edward Poppe was beatified by Pope John Paul II. Through beatification and canonization, the Church wishes to present examples to the faithful. What does the Blessed Edward Poppe want to teach us today?.

The importance of holiness

Poppe invites each and every one to become holy.

In his spiritual notebook of July 1917, he wrote the following:

“A religious who fails to say: “I am going to become a saint,” is a fool,’ Father Valentinus would say. There are many who say: “I should like to …” but there are few who say, “I am going to …” Nonetheless, Jesus is waiting for you to firmly say “I will become a saint”, for only ten will he take you by the hand to lead you up that step path. Many are afraid to speak these words because they only trust in themselves and think more of their own fear of suffering and weakness than of the power and the silence, the hidden encouragement of Jesus’ grace, O Jesus, teach us to decide sincerely: “I will become a saint”.

In the first letter he wrote in his capacity as priest on 19 May 1918, he elaborated this theme.

“You must be saints, you must not be ordinary, by which I mean common, priests. Otherwise your zeal and toil will not yield any result. Otherwise you may become lukewarm and worldly. Otherwise your sheep may stray in great numbers and get lost. One word from a saint is more effective than a whole series of sermons from an ordinary worker”.

To the Sisters at Moerzeke, he said the following on 24 October 1918: “There is only one way to be truly happy in this world and that is to strive for perfection and to become holy. Then one is happy oneself and one makes, without knowing as much, one’s whole entourage happy”.

Already in 1912, Poppe wrote to Sister Desirée: “ I would rather die than serve God half heartedly”. (This text is engraved in his tomstone).

And what does it mean to be holy? The explanation that he gave at St. Coleta’s in 1916: “It boils down to nothing more than to recognize the Lord’s will in all that overcomes us, whether it be good or bad, joy or suffering, and to bless His holy name and to do all our work, insignificant though it may be, out of love of God and of Jesus our Saviour”.

During the Religious Week of 17 February 1922, he wrote the following, “There is only one way that leads to heaven: it is perfection, holiness. The path leading to Heaven, to perfection has three sections: Perfection for beginners: the soul must be purified of all sins through penitence and mercy; Illumination for advanced believers: to allow oneself to be illuminated and instructed by Jesus through contemplation and reflection: unification for the perfect: united with God and changed in Him”.