“I went to the “Catechism” in as a child. It’s like Sunday school, but on Wednesday, and you go and learn about the Bible and Jesus. So, I had a good knowledge of what it is to be walking with Jesus, but I wouldn’t use those sort of words at that time. I had a distant Church relationship. I went to Church on Sunday, I knew there was a God somewhere, but little by little I thought I can do a lot by myself. I thought – He’s not helping me that often, but then I didn’t ask much anyway. So eventually I didn’t see an active God in my life, and forgot about Church.”
Jean-Marc married Carol, an English lady, in 1998. “I was very much a family man. I tried to make my family happy by working, taking care of the children at weekends, but eventually I wasn’t able to have a trustful relationship with my wife. I was a bit stupid. I probably didn’t have a good vision of what a couple was. I didn’t know how to make the relationship happier or more attractive. We saw each other as hard people. We wouldn’t show our weaknesses or needs, we wouldn’t share. My wife said I was unkind or unfeeling.”
Jean-Marc is a sensitive man, so I wondered how he got to be like this.
“We were mis-matched. I am extremely sensitive. I think I didn’t get what I wanted, I didn’t get any love, so little by little I got harder and harder. But I was not hard inside, I was sad and weak inside. Carol was very uncomfortable with talking and listening.”
Eventually Jean-Marc and Carol divorced. “It got so it was too harming for me. I was deeply unhappy. I made wrong choices, a job where I had money, a wife who would be rich and re-assuring, from a good family instead of fulfilling my need of being loved and being happy. I probably never let the need for sensitivity and true relationship arise.”
After the breakdown of relationship with Carol, Jean-Marc was offered a job in Bordeaux. “I thought maybe the distance would help bring us back to a better understanding of each other. I was putting money in the company we were buying, but in the end the books were not right, and the major partner decided I didn’t fit in the picture any more.”
“That was probably quite demoralising as well” I said.
“It’s exactly what happens.” Jean-Marc replied. “I was completely stripped away, no job, no wife…I just thought I’m going to walk on this pilgrimage “Chemin de St Jaques”, going to Compostela in , to think what is happening in my life. There are many starts on this pilgrimage, but I started at Le Puy en Velay in the centre of . I was only doing a few days of the route. On the first day, the 14th July, I was looking for a shady spot in the woods to have my picnic. A guy called Ismael (meaning Hear my voice Lord), who was homeless, came by. He said “Do you want some dry banana?” I thought “I don’t want this thing you dirty, disgusting man. I’m not from your world.” I’m not very prejudiced, but I was thinking about hygiene. It’s funny, but I was being more like my wife, very conscious about “what rubs on me”. It’s not very nice, it gets in the way of relationship. It’s not me really, I’m more of the countryside peasant! I saw myself as such a Pharisee, such a hard, stupid man. I just melted away.. yes, God got in. I shared the same spoon as Ismael, and he became my friend. He gave me a Bible”
