Jacques Fesch

Good Friday. Cruelly nailed to the Cross, Jesus is subjected to the sarcastic remarks of the two criminals who are suffering the same torment. One of them insults Him: “Are you not the Messiah? Then save yourself and us.” Seeing this strange prisoner’s patience, the other thief, touched by grace, defends Jesus: “This man has done nothing wrong.“ He then spoke to the Savior: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus answered him, “I assure you: this day you will be with me in Paradise” (cf. Lk. 23). With these words, Our Lord pronounced the first “canonization” in history. One must, therefore, “never despair of the divine mercy” (cf. Rule of Saint Benedict, ch. 4). As in the conversion of the good thief, the life of Jacques Fesch illustrates this beautiful maxim.

It has been said that a child’s upbringing begins twenty years before his birth with that of his mother. We must add-and with that of his father. Jacques’ father, Georges Fesch, was born in Liege in 1885, to parents who were already in their forties. He settled in France in the 1920’s, working as a bank director. An unbeliever, proud of it and proud to show it, he flaunted a “strong will.” His cynicism concealed bitterness, disappointments and disillusions. At times, his abundant table welcomed numerous companions. Yet, a determined worker, he was a success in business.

The fourth child in his family, Jacques, was born not having been wanted, in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, a suburb of Paris, on April 6, 1930, and received Baptism the following July 6. Mrs. Fesch shared her husband’s ideas. Although she did not practice any particular religion, she was a good mother to her little ones, whom she cherished and tenderly cared for. But when they reached the age of 13 or 14, she would turn her back on them. Jacques’ contact with his mother then became cold and reserved.

Jacques grew up without a particular interest in anything. He attended various academic institutions, from which he was expelled for his laziness and lack of discipline. He was spineless, apathetic, unstable, and corrupt. He always had a lot of money, and modeled himself on his father’s maxims: amorality, contempt for his fellow man. Despite all this, he made his First Communion, in keeping with custom. Wearing his white armband, he bears a limpid expression. But he was soon to forget all that. As a young man, he spent some of his nights in places of ill-repute; yet, his father was little concerned.

During the years 1947-1948, Jacques met Pierrette Polack, whose father held an important position in the management of the Alsacian Coal Board. From a Christian background, she was baptized and had made her First Communion. She made the first move, so it seems, to come into Jacques’ life, who was at this time working, after a fashion, in his father’s bank.

Jacques’ parents were not getting along, which resulted in a tense atmosphere. Mr. Fesch, who was charming with strangers, showed himself a sarcastic and proud person at home. In 1950, the family split up. Mrs. Fesch stayed in Saint-Germain-en-Laye; her husband settled in the region of Saumur. If the love of God does not live in the hearts of a husband and wife, their marriage is often quite precarious, as is tragically shown in the experience of the home into which Jacques was born.

A “marriage” without love

In 1950, Jacques left for Germany for his obligatory military service. Pierrette, who knew she was pregnant with his child, found a job in Strasbourg in her father’s business. After much hesitation, she finally told Jacques that the child she was expecting was his. Jacques waited to reach the age of majority to marry Pierrette in a civil ceremony in the city hall in Strasbourg on June 5, 1951, a month before the birth of little Veronica. He confessed, “I got married first of all because my wife was pregnant… I didn’t love my wife, I got along well with her, but as friends…” Released from military service, he found work in Mr. Polack’s business. But, after having embezzled funds, he parted ways with his father-in-law and split up with Pierrette, who would later say, “He was very unhappy when we broke up. I am sure that he suffered very much. He cried like a baby. We never stopped seeing each other.” When Jacques went to see his daughter Veronica at his father-in-law’s, he was not invited into the house. He remained on the threshold of the door to caress her…

With the intention of helping her son, Mrs. Fesch put a sum of one million francs at his disposal in order to launch a coal transport business (1953), but Jacques sank half of the sum in the purchase of a sports car. About this period, he would later write, “I found myself alone in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, even more unbalanced by this experience (separation with Pierrette) which gave me to taste remorse. I tried to work… one month. At the first setback, I abandoned everything…” At that time, one of his friends, Jacques Robbe, dangled the prospect of an adventure which at first might seem exciting: “What would be more romantic, adventurous and attractive than a friend who whispered in your ear the wonders of the free life of the lone sailor?” Jacques Robbe was not malicious, but was indeed harmful. He entertained the crazy idea he had drawn from films and reading of buying a sailboat to “run away from it all,” but he was to abandon his friend at the last minute… The sailboat cost two million francs. Jacques Fesch didn’t have the money, and his father refused to finance such a scheme.

An adventure at a high price

A crazy idea suddenly took shape in Jacques’ mind-he would get hold of the money by stealing it! He agreed to steal because this act follows naturally from the way he sees things. The accomplices he sought out, Robbe and Blot, decided to assault a moneychanger, Mr. Silberstein. They had no intent of killing him. Jacques, however, made a long trip to get hold of a pistol which belonged to his father.

On the morning of February 25, 1954, Jacques ordered from Mr. Silberstein the sum of 2,220,000 francs in gold bars, which he wished to pick up that evening. Around 6 p.m., he parked his car close to the moneychanger’s office, and took his pistol with the safety jammed. Robbe and Blot then left him. Robbe told a police officer, “Hurry, my best friend is making a big mistake.” Meanwhile, Fesch had hit Silberstein over the head with the butt of his pistol, without being able to make him lose consciousness. The banker called for help. Jacques took the safety off his pistol, hit Silberstein with the butt a second time, and clumsily shot himself in the finger. He made off with the money that was in the coffer (only 330,000 francs), and fled at full speed, chased by several passers-by. He dove under the arch of a carriage entrance and hid for a moment at the top of a stairway, then came down again. He had been recognized. A police officer shouted to him, “Hands up or I’ll shoot!” Jacques was quicker, and shot through the officer’s raincoat. The bullet hit the police officer right in the heart and killed him. Jacques continued to flee, and was finally stopped by a retired officer who threw a heavy door in his face and wounded him. Jacques collapsed.

Pierrette, who suspected nothing, was waiting for him at a café near the moneychanger’s office. Instead of Jacques, it was the police who went to look for her at this rendezvous. She was soon found innocent and released, after having been brought face to face with Jacques, whose head was still covered in blood from the blow he had received. On February 27, the murderer was committed to La Santé Prison. He would stay there three years.

Shortly after Jacques’ arrest, God rekindled in Mrs. Fesch’s heart some religious sentiments which had never been completely extinguished. Before dying of cancer and of sorrow in 1956, she said, “I offer my life so that my son might die well.”

The dawn of conversion

On the chaplain’s first visit, Jacques exclaimed right away: “Don’t bother! I am not a believer.” The priest nevertheless paid him a short sympathy call every day, as he did to the other prisoners. Among the books he provided Jacques with, only one caught his attention-the story of the apparitions of Our Lady of the Rosary in Fatima. This reading initiated Jacques’ return to the Christian faith. Mary is called the Morning Star of the Sun. Indeed, when devotion to the Blessed Virgin is aroused in a soul, it is a sure sign that God will come soon to enrich it with His grace. Innumerable faithful, obedient to the request of Our Lady of Fatima, recite this prayer after each decade of their Rosary: “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of Hell; lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who have most need of Thy mercy.” This little prayer doubtless exerts a salutary influence on sinful souls, and did, particularly, on that of Jacques Fesch.

One year after the crime, on February 28, 1955, during a visit to the prison, Pierrette informed Jacques of the consequences of a dramatic confidential story which the couple had lived through in anguish in December 1953, before Jacques’ imprisonment. This conversation gave rise to an emotional pain in Jacques’ soul, pain which robbed him of sleep over the course of many nights. On March 1, he distinctly heard a voice not of this earth say to him, “Jacques, you are receiving the graces of your death.” This shock brought about his instantaneous conversion. In his spiritual journal, he clarified, “That day, I was in my bed. My eyes were open, and I really suffered, for the first time in my life, with a rare intensity, because of what had been revealed to me concerning certain family matters, and it was then that a shout burst forth from my chest, a cry for help: ‘My God!’ And, instantly, like a violent wind that passes without anyone knowing where it came from, the Lord took me by the throat. And, from that moment on, I have believed with a firm conviction that has never left me since.” Jacques did not deduce the existence of God from reasoning; he met Him who alone was capable of transforming him by enveloping him in His tenderness. Fear had nothing to do with it, for the murderer very much expected at this time to avoid capital punishment.

Steps towards the light

After this passage from atheism to Christianity, a second conversion took place, on December 2, 1955. Jacques rose to the heroic fervor which entailed receiving his death from the hands of God, for himself and for others: “I was happy,” he wrote. “I am saved in spite of myself; I am being taken out of the world because I was lost in it… The punishment that awaits me is not a debt that I have to repay, but a gift that the Lord is giving me.” He gathered an abundance of information on the soul and on the final ends, Hell, the life of the blessed in Heaven, the Cross. It was a veritable novitiate in eternal life. In spite of his guards’ constant surveillance, he prayed on his knees. His neophyte’s apostolate to members of his family and other prisoners was fervently performed. In order to awaken them from their unbelief, he was severe with them, especially with Pierrette, whom out of love he wanted to convert, for his imprisonment had aroused in him genuine and profound love for her. “There is a double transformation in me,” he wrote her. “The chance to love you, and the fact that I love you.” He loved her, but he learned through experience that real love here on earth does not work without suffering. Little by little, faith was awakened in Pierrette’s soul. Several days before Jacques’ death, she went to receive Communion, after having been distant from the Church for more than ten years.

Religion with no discount

Jacques was now convinced that he was going to die, because Jesus had made it clear to him on two occasions that he was receiving graces for his death. He was sorry that his chaplain did not sufficiently dwell on eternal salvation. “This chaplain,” he wrote, “is a wise man… but he is reduced to presenting a synthesis of philosophical and religious concepts which is far removed from the simplicity of the Gospels.”

As for him, without being fanatical in regards to Hell, he was aware of his sins and of his bad inclinations. He looked damnation straight in the face, as a real possibility. Nevertheless, his entire journal speaks of real love and of a firm hope in Heaven. “My death is redeeming, even if it appears unfair. We must not struggle against what has been decided by God… and which is owing to His great mercy.” This repentant prisoner’s spirituality fits in with the truth of the Gospel. In the Apostolic Exhortation Reconciliatio et pænitentia, of December 2, 1984, Pope John Paul II recalls, “Nor can the church omit, without serious mutilation of her essential message, a constant catechesis on what the traditional Christian language calls the four last things of man: death, judgment (universal and particular), Hell and Heaven. In a culture which tends to imprison man in the earthly life at which he is more or less successful, the pastors of the church are asked to provide a catechesis which will reveal and illustrate with the certainties of faith what comes after the present life: beyond the mysterious gates of death, an eternity of joy in communion with God or the punishment of separation from Him. Only in this eschatological (concerning man’s destiny after death) vision can one realize the exact nature of sin and feel decisively moved to penance and reconciliation” (no. 26).

The secrets of his heart

Between August 1 and October 1, 1957, Jacques wrote his spiritual journal, intended for his daughter Veronica who was six years old at the time. He revealed not so much his familiarity with his family than his intimacy with God. Jacques had discovered Jesus, and his fervent hope was to make Him known to Veronica: “What I have, I give you for the day when, after you are an adult, you will, through these words, be able to follow the life of the man who was your papa and who never stopped loving you for one second.” The journal ends with these words: “If by the end of these pages I have succeeded in making you understand what life can be, real life, that begins in this world in order to bloom where everything is light, if you have been able to sense the greatness and the worth of the soul, and of what little importance worldly success is, these lines will not have been written in vain, and maybe one day, faced with God knows what ordeal, you yourself will draw from this example so close to you the strength and the courage to distinguish which direction the light comes from.”

Little by little, he developed the habit of discerning which thoughts came from God and which came from the devil. When Jesus made His presence felt, he wrote, “I would like to die because I have too much joy… There is nothing but a song of gratitude which should spring forth from our breast.” But there was no absence of moments of interior suffering: “My spiritual barometer, which was standing at ‘unsteady,’ is now steadily dropping to rain and fog. The world and its charms are making up ground they lost in grace’s invasion… Though I cannot keep more or less troubling thoughts from invading my mind, nothing can stop me from getting on my knees and saying my prayers, even if my attention is no longer sustained… This struggle will end when the good Lord wishes it to end… The only thing to my credit is that it is I who will receive the blade on the skull!… Obviously, it is not at all fun, but afterwards I will be so happy!… Only a quarter of an hour, in contrast to eternity!”

During this time, Jacques’ preliminary investigation and trial took place, a case that triggered impassioned debates in the assizes and the press. The verdict was handed down on April 6, 1957, the day before the Passion – a death sentence (the death penalty was enforced in France until 1981). On July 11, the appeal to the Supreme Court was rejected. The only way out was a presidential pardon.

Contemplation of the crucifix

As the hour of his execution approached, Jacques united himself ever more closely to Jesus’ Passion, and even went so far as to say, “My heart is full of joy. No more dread, no more fright, the Blessed Virgin has taken them away.” He often tried to put himself in Jesus’ place in His Passion: “The nails must be what hurts most, His hand forced against the wood, the point that is pressed on the hand to center it. Then the hammer blow hurled, and the flesh that bursts, and the blood that spurts… And after the first hand, the other one! Then the feet!… After that, the body’s least motion must make the wounds rub against the nails, and cause unbearable pain… And to think of the sufferings of a Mother who contemplates all this and can do nothing to comfort Her Son! Poor Virgin Mary, humble, silent and in tears at the foot of the cross…”

Late in the afternoon of September 30, 1957, Jacques Fesch’s lawyer, Mr. Baudet, informed his client that his petition for reprieve was rejected. The execution was set for the following morning. Jacques put his matrimonial affairs in order, officially marrying Pierrette in the Church, through the parish priest in Saint-Germain-en-Laye. On October 1, at three o’clock in the morning, he got up and made his bed. The last lines of his journal are eloquent: “In five hours, I will see Jesus. I am inundated with peace and my prayers flow like honey… Blessed Virgin, have pity on me! I believe that I will stop this journal where it is, being as how I hear disturbing noises. Let’s just hope that I take the blow. Blessed Virgin, help me! Good-bye to everyone, and may the Lord bless you.” His last letter was for his spiritual director: “I am waiting in the night and in peace… I have my eyes fixed on the crucifix and look at nothing but my Savior’s wounds. I continuously repeat, ‘This is for You.’ I want to hold onto this image up to the end, I who am going to suffer so little… I am waiting for Love.”

Around 5 o’clock in the morning, Jacques’ chaplain and lawyer entered his cell. In profound peace, he made his last confession and received Communion. He continued to repeat in his heart that the certainty of Heaven was close at hand. With his hands tied behind his back, he said to the chaplain, “The crucifix, Father, the crucifix!” He kissed his Lord emotionally, and was led to the scaffold. Eight minutes later, the execution took place. Nowadays, October 1 is the Feast of Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus, whom Jacques dearly loved. Like her, he had offered his life to Merciful Love. When her husband’s death was announced, Pierrette obtained his spiritual journal and read it from cover to cover the same day.

In December 1993, Cardinal Lustiger, the Archbishop of Paris, opened the preliminary inquiry for the beatification of Jacques Fesch. “I hope,” he said, “that one day he will be venerated as a model of sanctity.” Indeed, his conversion invites us never to despair of God’s mercy and of Our Lady’s intercession.

Like Ruth the Moabite, who pleased Boaz and who obtained from him permission to glean the ears of grain left in his field by the harvesters (Rt. 2:1-13), the Blessed Virgin Mary goes into the field of the Church and the world, preciously gathering the lost souls, those from whom no one expects anything. She places them, as it were, in Her apron, protects them from the fearful Judge before whom She alone was able to find favor, and, as it were, smuggles them into the eternal granaries of the Father.

O most merciful Virgin Mary, be our guide, our light, and our consolation on the road that leads to Paradise. Deign to lead us by the hand to the Heavenly city of which You are Queen, so that we might bless for all eternity the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation.

In these thoughts of confidence in Mary, Mother of Mercy, we pray for all your intentions, including your deceased.