On the Origins of Eucharistic Crusades: Aid Granted to the Poilus during the Great War
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It is in the summer heat of 1914 that the Great War breaks out. At the end of August, in Auray, Marthe Martin writes a text called « Appel aux enfants » to arouse a burst of patriotism in Brittany. Two years later, a monthly leaflet will follow. This initiative is combined with the action in Bordeaux of a nun and teacher, Genevieve Boselli, who, with her pupils, organizes spiritual and material aid to French soldiers in the front line. In November 1915, the Jesuit Albert Bessières transforms this « Apostolate of the cigarette » into a movement gently oriented toward the Eucharist : the « Children’s Crusade », whose name becomes the « the Crusade of the Eucharist ». This perspective fits in with Quam Singulari, the 1910 encyclical of Pius X, which encourages children to receive communion at a young age.
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