Anniversary of the death of Father Émilien Tardif
One year later
Brother of Father Émilien, Fr. Louis Tardif, o.m.i.
The Dominican people desire to know Father Émilien's family. It goes without saying that the members of the family were very well received, and in a protocolary manner. Mrs. Maria Armenteros and Mrs. Carmen Josephina de Torròn, official representatives of the community of the Servants of the Living Christ, a lay community founded on the initiative of Father Émilien, accompanied the members of the Tardif family.
On June 8, the anniversary day of Father Émilien's death, they attended, at the municipal cemetery of Santiago, where the remains of Father Emiliano rest, a celebration presided over by Father Luc Lafleur, m.s.c., parish priest of the parish of Notre-Dame de l'Altagracia. They noticed that arrangements had been added for the depositing of flowers and votive lamps near the funeral vault of the Fathers of the Sacred Heart. The visits and the veneration at this place continue; the popular faith remains alive, the requests for intercession are real.
Abbé Yves Rancourt
At the Maison de l'Annonciation, the house of the community of the Servants of the Living Christ where Father Tardif lived, located on the street named Padre Emiliano Tardif, in Santo Domingo, Hélène and Martial clearly saw the fervor of the Dominicans in a chapel that has doubled in size over the last few months. All day, before and after work, between 4 a.m. and 5 a.m., we see workers praying to the Blessed Sacrament in this chapel accessible to the public; this piety astonishes! Moreover, the house is bustling with activities for both the young and the elderly. The mission of evangelization is perpetuated.
The Casa de la Anunciación
“Believing that these houses of evangelization were my uncle's doing is no longer possible. We see that it is the Spirit who acts, that it is the work of Christ; my uncle was only the instrument.”
After a year, it is a father whom one mourns; the absence of Father Émilien creates a void among the members of the community. The great physical resemblance of Adrien, the brother of Father Emiliano, stirred many emotions among them. The loss of Father Émilien greatly affects his adopted family. They have lost one of their own, a Dominican citizen, a spiritual father who was the initiator of a new missionary breath in the Dominican Republic and elsewhere in the world.
Sr. Adrienne Tardif, sister of Father Émilien Tardif; Father André Dumas; Adrien Tardif
On Thursday, June 8, it is the inauguration of the school of evangelization 'Jean Paul II' and the retreat house 'Padre Emiliano Tardif', an international project so desired by Father Émilien. Maria Armenteros says of this school that it will be a 'spiritual lung' where what Father Emiliano proclaimed again and again in 72 countries, at the farthest reaches of the world, will be taught: 'Jesus is Alive and he is in our midst'.
The inauguration of the school is a celebration, a Mass of thanksgiving, filled with joy and thanks for all the small miracles that made it possible to continue, after the death of Father Emiliano, this grandiose project that verges on the miraculous. Among the participants, there were political, military, and religious dignitaries; even the ambassador of Canada in the Dominican Republic, Mr. Picard of Rivière du Loup, was there. The blessing and the eucharistic celebration were presided over by Cardinal Nicolas Lopez Rodriguez, who was very happy to bless a new space for the 'Life of the Spirit', as he said, on the occasion of the first anniversary of the arrival in Heaven of Father Emiliano, a friend and a missionary always present with us.
The uncles and aunts leaving the Dominican Republic for Quebec, Hélène and Martial remain another week, and are invited to a ceremony that officialized the name of a park: the Padre Emiliano Tardif park, where there will be a bust sculpted by an artist of the country. Later, the civil authorities plan to give his name to a great avenue of the city of Santiago.
These are again marks of appreciation of the population of the Dominican Republic and of its people toward a missionary who was at once Canadian and Dominican.
Thank you! Hélène and Martial for your collaboration on this text.