Sister Rutan's modern character in the universal church
Sister Rutan a forerunner in welfare services.
Before her stay in Dax, she had been in Pau where she opened a wool weaving workshop for foundlings taken care of by the hospital; she was teaching them to read and write and at the same time she was giving them a skill.
When she arrived in Dax, she was amazed at seeing so many children on their own in the streets and she opened the two class rooms, one for boys and the other for girls before launching the works for the chapel even. The Daughters of Charity were nurses, as from that time they also were school mistresses.
During the following years, the number of patients increased but resources certainly did not, in 1788 the total amount of contributions and alms was but of 211 French pounds, in granaries wheat was scarce and in 1788, Sister Rutant reluctantly decided to close down the school rooms because she could no longer afford to feed the children at lunch.
However as she was an authentic Daughter of Charity, not only did she take care of the sick and the children, she also bore in her heart another type of misery, that of young deserted women :" besides beds for the sick ther is within the hospital facilities a shelter for deserted young women without financial resources who, in an attempt to cover their self indulgence, might be willing to suppress their baby".
The hospital statutes as validated by the Parliament of Bordeaux provided that the hospital would admit women from Dax and its adjacent surroundings only and at their 8th month of pregnancy. Yet, a municipal magistrate, Mr. Darrack , had one his friends' daughter admitted on a false certificate of her dwelling in Dax while she and her family were from Mugron. He had a serious dispute with Sister Rutan and the Bishop who reported his doings to the Parliament of Bordeaux. At that time welfare services were not run by the state as they are nowadays and it was the church who used to take all social services in charge. Sister Rutan's initiatives made her all the more popular and the Dax people truly loved their Daughters of Charity working at the hospital.
To be involved in a borderless network, (global action), to be respectful of mobility ( yearly vows) and to make the most out of scarcity are modern concepts of our time and yet Saint Vincent de Paul had put those principles into practice as early as the XVIIth century.
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