“God doesn’t choose only those who are able but enables those he chooses.”
My name is Marie-Madeleine Tremblay, from St Vincent-sur-Oust. I have 3 children and 8 grand children, of which 2 are foster children. I have been a widow for 8 years. I have been involved in different activities: foster parenting while I raised my own children, and most importantly, my work at the Yves Rocher cosmetic factory for 32 years.
Retired for the last several years, I have worked as a secretary for the Peillac home care centre (ADMR). Since 2017, I’ve been an Associate of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I also accompany a group of 12 persons within the Christian Movement of Retirees of St Vincent-sur-Oust, since 2019. For the last three years, I help prepare food packages in the Community Social Action Centre. I am also a member of the liturgy team in my parish.
The need to help, visit and share is a necessity for me. What I find most difficult at times is my availability, to know what is most important.
I think I bring connection and make people feel good. I receive human warmth, love, a reason to live. I was filled with joy on the 60th anniversary of the M.C.R: beautiful encounters.
I’ve gone through hard times with great difficulty: illness and the death of my spouse in 2015. Even though I was volunteering, I got lost in solitude and isolation. It was then that I understood that you can’t give up, nothing is ever finished, you must continue to embrace the future, to share and to love. ‘Don’t feel inferior’. I heard this phrase in Lourdes, a phrase that moves me and helps me when I am in doubt.
Marie-Madeleine Tremblay, ASCJ St Vincent-sur-Oust