Saint Claude La Colombière

Saint Claude La Colombière was a French Jesuit, preacher, and spiritual director. As confessor of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque at Paray-le-Monial, he recognized the truth of her revelations and was the first to spread devotion to the Heart of Jesus. The Roman Martyrology commemorates him on February 15, the day of his death.

He was born on February 2, 1641, at Saint-Symphorien-d’Ozon in the Dauphiné, into the family of a notary. He studied in Vienne and in Lyon. He valued friendship, literature, and the arts, and he himself later admitted that in choosing religious life he felt a great aversion to it. Even so, at seventeen he entered the Jesuit novitiate in Avignon.

There he made his first vows and for five years taught grammar and literature. In 1666 he was sent to Paris to study theology, where he was also tutor to the sons of Colbert, minister of Louis XIV. After his ordination to the priesthood he returned to Lyon and soon became known as a preacher. In 1674, during his tertianship, he vowed to observe faithfully all the constitutions and rules of the order.

On February 2, 1675, he made his solemn profession and was named rector of the Jesuit college at Paray-le-Monial. In the Visitation monastery there, Sister Margaret Mary Alacoque, to whom Christ was revealing his Heart, was living in painful uncertainty. According to her testimony, the Lord had promised to send her “his faithful servant and perfect friend.” Father Claude judged her experiences to be authentic and told her to write them down. When in June 1675 she passed on to him the Lord’s request that a feast be established in honor of his Heart, he accepted this mission and offered himself to that Heart.

In 1676 he left for London as preacher to the Duchess of York, Mary of Modena, wife of the future King James II. He preached in the chapel of St. James’s Palace, gave spiritual direction, and prepared for reconciliation with the Church many who had left her. “I could write a book about the mercy of God I’ve seen Him exercise since I arrived here,” he wrote after a year. Work and the climate undermined his health; signs of a serious lung disease appeared.

At the end of 1678, when England was shaken by rumors of a supposed papist plot, he was falsely accused and arrested. He spent three weeks in the King’s Bench Prison, after which he was expelled from the country by royal decree. He returned to France gravely ill; in Lyon he still served as spiritual father to the young Jesuits. In the summer of 1681 he was sent back to Paray-le-Monial, where he died on February 15, 1682, the first Sunday of Lent, after a severe hemorrhage. He was 41 years old.

Pope Pius XI beatified him on June 16, 1929, and John Paul II canonized him on May 31, 1992, in the Vatican Basilica. Already on October 5, 1986, the same pope had prayed at his tomb in Paray-le-Monial and called him the first to spread the message of Saint Margaret Mary. He left behind sermons, letters, and retreat notes.