EYMARD, Pierre-Julien, Blessed.
N. at La Mure d'Isère (Grenoble), on 4 Feb. 1811; d. there, on 1 Aug. 1868. Overcoming family obstacles, in Oct. 1831 he entered the Seminary of Grenoble, from which he emerged ordained priest on 20 July 1834. First as assistant priest at Chate, and then as parish priest at Monteynard, he gave luminous proof of piety and zeal, so much so that he was held up as an example of perfection. Austere with himself, but generous toward others, he exercised such a charm as to transform, within a few years, a parish long abandoned into a model of Christian life.
Having entered the Society of Mary, he was judged worthy to hold the offices of spiritual director at Belley, of provincial at Lyons, and of superior of the college at La Seyne-sur-Mer.
In the sanctuary of Fourvière the Madonna called him to found a religious congregation devoted to the perpetual adoration of the Most Holy Sacrament and to Eucharistic apostolate. Assured of God’s will, on 13 May 1836 he began in Paris the Congregation of the Religious of the Most Holy Sacrament (which comprises priests and lay brothers) and later that of the Servants of the Most Holy Sacrament. He also founded the Association of the Most Holy Sacrament to unite the faithful—and above all priests—to the life of adoration of his Institute, forming a great family of adorers.
For twelve years he labored to extend the Eucharistic kingdom with living faith and ardent love, amid countless crosses and humiliations heroically borne. His preaching was collected in five highly esteemed little volumes of elevations. He was beatified in 1925.
His Congregation, spread throughout the world, continues the work of its founder, carrying out his motto: “May thy Eucharistic kingdom come always and everywhere.”