Live Rule
Throughout her life, the Servant of God was a model of obedience. As a child, she practiced this virtue, which was going to mark her life. She understood that God’s will expressed itself through the voices of her parents and of her spiritual director. Since then she started a tireless fight against the defect of her temper, knowing that stubbornness could lead to the failure of what God’s grace had sown into her soul. For her, the chaff is above all her own will and as “she wants to become a saint”, she knew that she could achieve this only by surrendering her own judgment. She will be obedient, no matter what it costs her.She put all her actions under the rule of obedience. She was completely obedient to Father Reichard’s guidance, which she recognized as designated by God to show her His will. She revealed to him her interior with the constant concern not to hide anything from him; she asked his advice for all the details of her behavior; she strictly followed his advice in the midst of the hardest pains and regardless of any disgust. Later, she vowed, “to obey her confessor as her spiritual director and Superior, to completely reveal her conscience to him, without the slightest reserve as far as her inner life is concerned”.
Father Reichard could testify: “She does everything in the spirit of obedience”. “Your Excellency (Bishop Raess) knows that she was all the time perfectly obedient […], I repeat and I confirm that everything in her conduct was pure obedience and that with a docility of heart and spirit which never denied even a moment from her childhood on until this day”.
She asked Jesus: “Oh my Jesus, grant me the grace to be obedient to my spiritual director, whom You have given me. Show him the way to lead me; enlighten him about my passions; place on his lips those words which he must put in my soul. I want to recognize Your will in his words.”
The conscience of the Servant of God was always guided by obedience. From her earliest childhood, her conscience was so delicate that the slightest deviation towards her own plans made her afraid of offending God. She overcame temptation and if ever she disobeyed her parents the slightest bit, she immediately did penance. She kept this sensitivity of conscience towards Father Reichard and Bishop Raess. She was heroic in the pursuit of its literal sense. She said, “What a powerful weapon is obedience to fight against the demon! It supports the battle with courage; it makes the face serene, fills your heart with joy. You feel supported, and guided in the battle; you do not need to be afraid of steps being led astray, dangerous steps. Victory is assured.”
Mother Alphonse Maria followed the Rules of her Institute. Father Reichard could testify: “She is like the living Rule. She observed the Institute’s prescriptions with meticulous exactness, preferring to hold on to the ascetic practices which were most revolting to her nature”. She was unshakeable in her obedience. The Servant of God had to fight heroically to maintain the Congregation’s spirit as it had been inspired from heaven and especially in the crisis which broke out with the houses of Würzburg, Vienna, and Sopron.
131. She taught her Daughters the heroic obedience she had practiced herself and which consists in obeying those equal and those inferior. She said: “Concerning temporal things, in everything that is not against God’s commandments, the soul must give preference to the will of others, mainly when things are painful to one’s nature. You may not think, my children, that everything is done when you do your Superior’s will; you must also be disposed to do, in the smallest things, the will of your Sisters, even if they are younger than you or less educated, and when you have to command the others, you still have to make an effort to do their will as if it were yours. You have to think that it is God Himself asking you to do this or that. O, lucky the soul that does not do anything according to its own will, but only that of others! The merits are great before God.”