There are Sundays measured in minutes of Eucharist, and Sundays measured in hours of shared life. This was one of the latter. We spent it at the church of Our Lady of the Annunciation, in the working-class neighborhood of Buxerolles, within the Parish of Saint Jacques des Hauts de Poitiers, animated by three sscc brothers: Bertrand Cherrier, Luc Schweitzer, and Corneille Kipulu.
A community on the Camino de Santiago
On arrival, it was Bertrand Cherrier himself, the parish priest, who set the scene for us: a simple neighborhood, crossed—not by chance—by the Camino de Santiago. Before Mass, he gave us a talk in the garden on a theme that must run through the whole of sscc religious life: zeal, and how to overcome one's own fears in order to live it, recalling the experience of the Good Father in the barn at La Motte.
"I am my own first enemy to belief"
Bertrand spoke from his own experience, without embellishment. He confessed that until the age of 28 he earned his living playing football—"I used to think with my feet," he said, amid laughter—and that fear has always been his first and greatest obstacle. On arriving at the Jesuit Faculty in Paris, he had to choose between Latin, Greek, or Hebrew in order to pursue his studies. He wanted none of them. A professor forced him to decide, and he chose Greek by process of elimination. That language, born of fear, became over the years a faithful companion: today he still reads the Gospels in Greek to prepare his homilies.
From this he drew a conviction he wanted to share: a religious does not simply do what he wants, but discovers that he is capable of loving also what he has not chosen. He told how, happy in his work with at-risk youth in rural Aveyron, his provincial asked him to leave it all to become a parish priest in Paris. Fear reappeared. But an elderly brother of 94, sharing obedience with him, left him with a phrase he said he has never forgotten: "Everywhere there are people to love."
Quoting Job—"My God, I knew you only by what others told me"—Bertrand explained that true discernment is not born of fear but of a personal encounter with the peace of the Risen One. And he sharply distinguished authentic zeal from the zeal of the "zealots": it is not fanaticism or violence—he recalled that it was precisely fear that led Judas to betray Jesus—but tenderness. A tenderness that, as he recalled quoting the Pope, is capable of disarming the adversary... and that today is also needed to "disarm artificial intelligence." To leave one's own barn, the shelter where one feels safe, with boldness: that was his final invitation before leaving us to a time of reflection ahead of the Eucharist.
Feast, faith, and family under one roof
The Eucharist that followed was both solemn and festive, accompanied by the wonderful parish choir. An intergenerational and international community—among them, the brothers and sisters of the Poitiers Session—filled the church. The youngest had their own space within the church itself throughout the celebration: a detail that says much about the family spirit found in Buxerolles.
Afterward came the moment of sharing a meal with the parishioners, drawn out by the good atmosphere. There was time for sports, coordinated by Chantal Cherrier, and time for music, with karaoke and songs performed by artists from the parish itself. The day closed with vespers, putting a serene finishing touch on an intense day.
A Church with open doors
A day immersed in a very lively parish reality, in the very land that saw the birth of the Founders. Thanks to the parishioners and to the three sscc brothers of the community who welcomed us with such joy: today, in Buxerolles, we felt at home.
07/27/2026