Saint Louise de Marillac

Saint Louise de Marillac was a wife, mother, and widow who, together with Saint Vincent de Paul, founded the Company of the Daughters of Charity. The Roman Martyrology commemorates her on March 15.

She was born on August 12, 1591. Her father was Louis de Marillac, lord of Ferrières; she never knew her mother. In early childhood she was sent to be brought up at the royal monastery of the Dominican nuns at Poissy, and later to a boarding house in Paris. In 1604 she lost her father. She wished to enter the Capuchin nuns, but because of her frail health she was advised against it.

In 1613, obedient to her family’s wishes, she married Antoine Le Gras, secretary to Queen Marie de’ Medici. They had a son, Michel. When her husband fell seriously ill, Louise went through a time of anxiety and doubt. On the solemnity of Pentecost in 1623 she received an inner light while at prayer: she understood that she was to stay with her husband and that a time would come when she would be able to make vows and live in a community serving its neighbor. She nursed her husband until his death on December 21, 1625.

At that time Father Vincent de Paul became her spiritual director. In the parishes he was setting up Confraternities of Charity, in which ladies cared for the sick poor. At his request Louise began to visit these confraternities: she encouraged the ladies, nursed the sick herself, taught the catechism, and set up schools. Country girls began to come forward to serve the sick, and Vincent entrusted their training to Louise.

On November 29, 1633, Louise took several of them into her home in Paris. That day is regarded as the beginning of the Company. It was something new: the sisters did not live in an enclosure but went out to the poor. Saint Vincent said that they have “for monastery the houses of the sick, for cell a hired room, for chapel the parish church, for cloister the streets of the city.” On March 25, 1634, Louise vowed to devote her whole life to this work, and later, together with the first sisters, she made the vows that the Daughters of Charity still renew every year on the solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord.

The sisters nursed the sick in their homes and in hospitals, took in abandoned children, and cared for the elderly, prisoners, galley convicts, and wounded soldiers. Louise taught them to see Christ himself in the poor. In her own lifetime, in 1652, the first sisters arrived in Poland at the invitation of Queen Marie Louise Gonzaga. Louise died in Paris on March 15, 1660, a few months before Saint Vincent. Her relics rest in the chapel of the sisters’ motherhouse in Paris.

Pope Benedict XV beatified her on May 9, 1920, and Pius XI canonized her on March 11, 1934. In 1960 John XXIII declared her the patroness of all who devote themselves to Christian social works. The Congregation of the Mission and the Daughters of Charity keep her solemnity on May 9, the anniversary of her beatification.