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Synopsis: The First and Second Orders. Theobald, Count of Champagne. He offers himself to St. Norbert as a disciple. St. Norbert refuses to admit him, but gives him the little white scapular. The first Third Order established in the Church.
It is not difficult to discover in the history of St. Norbert's career traces of the origin of the Third Order of Prémontré. In the year 1120 the Saint had laid the foundations, in the valley of Prémontré, of an Order which was already showering its blessings upon the northern districts of France, Flanders, and part of Germany. Monasteries quickly sprung up in the footsteps of the man of God. As early as 1121 a number of pious women, filled with a spirit of emulation, eagerly demanded permission to enrol themselves among the disciples of the famous Patriarch. Norbert gladly welcomed them, and thus became the Founder of the Second Order.
Doubtless, in the ardour of his zeal, he often asked himself whether it was not possible to open the doors of his Institute to persons living in the world. When men were obliged, by their position, age, or health to dwell in the midst of the world, was it not possible for the cloister to grant them some of its spiritual favours? In a word, was it not possible to establish a new organisation which would be neither worldly nor monastic; which would exist in the very busom of human society, yet bear, beneath secular clothing, a truly religious soul? Frequently, indeed, must St. Norbert have asked himself these questions, but even in 1124 nothing in the shape of a solution had appeared. The unexpected plays a notable part in the rulings of Providence; it is not chance - it is the hidden hand of God which brings each event to pass in its proper time and according to His good will and pleasure.
The following event gave Norbert the opportunity of realising the idea so long pondered and matured. The author of his Life, a contemporary and disciple of the Saint, narrates it with a simplicity of expression which it is desirable to preserve.
Our Father Norbert was truly the burning and shining light, [Orig-001] as seen in these latter times. He was the light placed not beneath the bushel, but on the summit of the mountain. In Germany as well as in France, his name was known and glorified. The return of the Blessed Father from Westphalia to France was everywhere heralded by the report of the conversion of Count Godfrey of Kappenberg. All admired the sudden change which had transformed a great prince into a humble religious, and a riotous court into a calm and peaceful monastery. This example appealed with a special force to one of the noblest lords in France, Count Theobald. [Orig-002]
This illustrious personage, who had been thus touched by the grace of god, was, according to all chroniclers of the age, the most powerful prince in the kingdom of France, and beyond all question the first in rank after the king himself. "Theobald IV, surnamed the Great, was son of Stephen, Count of Champagne and Blois, and Alice, daughter of William the Conqueror, King of England. In 1102 he succeeded to his father's estate. Together with his father's virtues and valour he inherited immense property, and says Guibert of Nogent, as many castles as there are days in the year, but these dignities and all his wealth only rendered him more humble and more charitable." [Orig-003]
In a word Theobald appears to us in the twelfth century as an ideal of a Christian prince whose only object is to secure the happiness of his people, and to encourage them in the practice of virtue. So fervent a man could not remain deaf to the voice of Heaven. He came without delay to Prémontré in search of the illustrious Founder. To him he disclosed the noble aspirations he felt for the service and glory of God.
The ways of Providence are wonderful. Theobald had come only with the view of obtaining good counsel and advice, and lo! "considering the eloquence of the man of God, the sweetness of his countenance, and the wisdom of his answers, he is so charmed with him and his work that he offers himself entirely to Norbert with all his possessions". [Orig-004]
At such a proposal the Founder of an Institute, which was only four years old and in great need of protectors, must surely have smiled. Another more interested or less enlightened than Norbert would immediately have listened with pleasure to an offer of this description; but Norbert, without accepting or rejecting it, asked for a few days of prayer to consult Our Lord and to confide to Him his project. What a contradiction to the slanders which which some historians are pleased to dishonor the memory of the holy Founders of Orders!
In fact, St. Norbert well knew that the numerous castles of Count Theobald could not be alienated or made useful to his Order. To adopt such a measure would be a menace even to the kingdom of France itself, and a disturbance of the feudal hierarchy of his vassals. He knew, moreover, the generosity of the Count in comforting the poor and in building churches and monasteries. He knew that Theobald was the father of the orphan, the defender of widows, the feeder of the hungry, the refuge of lepers. A man so discreet as Norbert could not place in the monastic life one whom God had called as he well knew, to such a career.
As Theobald was awaiting the Saint's answer, Heaven suggested the reply to Norbert. "You will not be a religious," he said to the Count of Champagne; "you will bear the yoke of the Lord as you have done till this day, and you will add to it that of wedlock. May God preserve us from opposing the designs of His Providence in your behalf." "If such is the will of God," answered the Count, "it is not for me to gainsay it, but be assured I shall not wed any but the woman you choose for me."
"See," cries the historian of St. Norbert, "how great was his discernment of spirits. Two princes, Godfrey and Theobald, come to him; he makes one give up all; the other he bids keep all, and possess all as if he possessed nothing." [Orig-005]
This offer of the Count of Champagne and its rejection by St. Norbert were, in the eternal decrees of God, the events which were to bring about the foundation of the Third Order of Prémontré. Before sending him away, Norbert drew up for him a Rule of life containing special practices sufficiently austere to become for souls of good will a safe road and bulwark against the evils of the age. In addition to these precautions, he thought it desirable to give the new Brother some outward token or sign of his aggregation to the Order; he therefore solemnly invested Theobald with a little woollen scapular of whit colour. This the Count ever afterwards wore as a symbol of the bond which united him to the Norbertine family. Henceforth in the midst of his gay and glittering court he was to be seen contentedly clad in simple and modest garments, and observing a rule of life far surpassing that of the pious laymen of his district. [Orig-006]
Not content with this close connection, he wished to have about him some of the children of the holy Patriarch, and he founded with this purpose within the very confines of his residence the Abbey of Château-Thierry, transferred a few years later to Valsecret, in the diocese of Soissons. His liberality to the Mother-Abbey of Prémontré was unbounded. Until the end of his life, he kept continually with him two Canons of the Order, to whom he confided the direction of his conscience, the distribution of his alms and the spiritual care of the inhabitants of his domain.
The Third Order was thus definitely established. It was the third branch of a single Order, a branch destined to draw to itself the men and women of the world. by the institution of the Canons Regular of Prémontré, Norbert had enkindled in the heart of the Catholic church a furnace of uninterrupted prayer, and an unceasing apostolate. By the foundation of the Norbertine nuns, he had opened to the "weaker sex" the path of devotedness and self-sacrifice. By the creation of the Third Order, he has introduced the religious life into the busom of the family and into the whirl of secular pursuits.
We have used the word creation. Such, indeed, was the character of the work. It is certain that before St. Norbert, no one had succeeded in establishing in the Church a state of life which should be midway between the cloister and the world, or, to put it in different language, a religious Order which should penetrate into Christian homes in the midst of the world. To him belongs the credit of having been chosen by God as His instrument for the accomplishment of so great a work. The Dictionary of Trévoux said in the eighteenth century: "The Carmelites, the Augustinians, and the Franciscans contend with one another for the honour of having originated th eidea of Third Orders. If, however, it is true that the Third Order of Prémontré began in the very lifetime of St. Norbert (Père Hélyot himself says so), since St. Norbert died in 1134, the Order of Prémontré must be the first which had a Third Order." [Orig-006]
"It was," says a more recent author, "the first institution of the kind, and was imitated in subsequent years by several other Founders, and notably by St. Francis and St. Dominic." [Orig.-007]
St. Norbert has then the glory of pointing the way to these two great men - an honour which may well be appreciated by the sons of the holy Patriarch and by all the firends of his Institute. The Norbertine Tertiaries were originally called Fratres et Sorores ad Succurrendum (from the assistance given to and received from the Order), which name is given also in the Brief of Benedict XIV concerning the members of the Norbertine Third Order. It is possible that this Brotherhood did not take the name of Third Order until after the foundation of similar institutions by St. Francis and St. Dominic; but if the name is more recent, it cannot be denied that the idea reaches back to the time of St. Norbert.
However that may be, the solemn aggregation of Theobald to the Order of Prémontré could not fail to act as a powerful stimulus to the Count's fervour, and as an edifying example for his courtiers and people. When he died, on 10th January 1151, Norbert, his friend and spiritual father, was no longer there to bless and strengthen him; but by his bedside were disciples of the Saint to comfort him, and bid forth the Christian soul in the name of God. St. Norbert himself from his throne in Heaven descended to meet his well-beloved son, the Count of Champagne, Chartres and Blois, the humble Brother of the Third Order of Prémontré. His name was inscribed by loving hands in the Necrology of Prémontré and Valsecret; and the Ephemerides Hagiologicae of the Order give a sketch of his life on the 26th September: "In France, commemoration of Theobald, of pious and glorious memory, Count of Champagne and Blois, etc. . . . ".
