**DAUGHTERS OF CHARITY OF SAINT VINCENT DE PAUL (Paris).** – A religious institute founded by St. Vincent de Paul (v.) and St. Louise de Marillac (v.). Its origins date back to 1617, when St. Vincent established in Châtillon-les-Dombes (Bresse) the first Company of Charity, or more precisely to 1629, when the Company moved from rural parishes to major centers (Paris, parish of St. Savior). The ladies of the city, who could not always personally perform the necessary services for the poor, often entrusted this task to their maids, which was detrimental to those assisted. St. Vincent then conceived the idea of associating with the ladies good young women who would dedicate themselves to the exercise of charity. The young women from the countryside seemed most suited to this purpose; he therefore selected some and distributed them among the various companies in Paris. However, after some time, experience showed that it was necessary to first know and form them; thus, a kind of community was initiated. The work was entrusted to Louise de Marillac, widow Le Gras, president of the Charity of St. Nino, who received three or four of them into her home on November 29, 1633.
The people called them "D. of C.," servants of the sick poor, and this name has remained, along with the original gray habit "à la campagnole" and that headdress, which in the 19th century formed the current "corrected" characteristic. The first regulations date shortly after November 29, 1633. From morning to evening, the life of piety permeates the charitable activity of the D. of C. ("To leave God for God," as St. Vincent repeated, meant that the sister, when necessary, must know how to renounce even this, recognizing in the spirit of her vocation that she has made them her masters). For 27 years (1633–1660), St. Vincent lovingly attended to their formation. His weekly "conferences," recorded by the sisters, form two substantial volumes.
**Legislation.** A constant concern of St. Vincent was that his daughters not be considered, nor consider themselves, religious according to the juridical concepts of the time. He therefore removed from their language everything that recalled the idea of a religious community. The Institute is called a Company; the novitiate, a seminary; the superior, a serving sister; the residence, a house. Vows were permitted on an experimental basis to Louise de Marillac and four other sisters on March 25, 1642. It was definitively established that they should be "private and only annual." March 25, the feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is the date consecrated to the renewal of these annual vows, when the D. of C., already free of herself, offers herself to the Lord with renewed zeal. The purpose of the Institute is defined by the founder in these terms: "To give oneself to God in order to love and serve Him in the person of the poor, assisting them both bodily and spiritually." That is, to attend to one's own and others' sanctification through the exercise of charity. To the initial work of "visiting the poor in their homes" were later added schools for girls, assistance to foundlings (1638), galley slaves (1640), the elderly, and wounded soldiers (1653). The Archbishop of Paris, C.-F. de Gondi, approved the Institute on November 20, 1646, and again on January 18, 1655. The King granted letters patent in November 1657, and the Parliament registered them on December 16, 1658. After the death of St. Vincent, his successors providentially worked to consolidate and preserve the founder's work from any alteration. René Almeras, his first successor (1660–1673), sought and obtained from Cardinal de Vendôme, the Pope's legate, the pontifical approval, revised and ordered the common rules, which were then promulgated by his successor, Edmond Jolly (1672–1697). In 1718, Jean Bonnet (1711–1733) promulgated the constitutions, which determined the conditions for admission, the organization of the Company in general and of individual houses, the formalities of elections, etc. Before entering the Institute, a young woman remains a postulant for three months, then is admitted to the seminary (novitiate) for a year of probation, after which she receives the habit proper to the D. of C. After five years in the seminary, she makes her first profession with some special solemnity; the annual vows, which she then renews each year. The highest authority in the Company belongs to the Superior General of the Congregation of the Mission, from whom, by legitimate and unbroken tradition officially confirmed by Leo XIII (July 25, 1882), the Company depends and to whom the vow of obedience is directed. The Company is governed by the superior of the motherhouse, elected every three years, assisted by a Council of sisters, also elected every three years, who hold the offices of assistant, treasurer, and official. To this organization, fixed by the first regulations, was added in the 18th century the grouping of various houses into provinces, each headed by a sister as visitor with her own Council, and a priest of the Mission, elected by the Superior General, as director.
At the death of St. Vincent, the Company had 51 houses; in 1700, 300 with 1,000 sisters; in 1790, 430 with 4,300 sisters. The French Revolution suppressed it along with all other religious communities. Many, in secular dress, continued to serve the poor in secret. Several suffered martyrdom. Napoleon in 1809 restored their legal existence but attempted to remove them from the jurisdiction of the Superior General of the Congregation of the Mission. It took all the firmness of the Congregation's vicar general, Dominique Hanon (1807–1816), to resist the attempt to confine them to the Fenestrelle prison (1811–1814). From 1815 onward, their progress was uninterrupted, and in the 19th century the Company spread to all parts of the world.
With the increase in members and houses came a multiplication of works, so that all forms of assistance developed in modern times found the D. of C. in the forefront. The names of Sister Rosalie Rendu (1787–1856), spiritual mother of the St. Vincent de Paul Conferences founded by F. Ozanam, and Sister Giuseppina Nicoli (1863–1924), the apostle of charity in Sardinia, remain linked in this field to the most varied and ingenious initiatives. The sisters work in hospitals, ambulances, sanatoriums, maternity and infant homes, dispensaries, health centers, boarding houses, colleges, workshops, etc. Free schools have remained and continue to exist since 1836. The kindergartens, where the D. of C. were the first to introduce Froebel and Montessori methods, flourish everywhere. Numerous associations with religious and social purposes have been created by the directors of the D. of C.; suffice it to mention the patronage centers, and in France the women's unions, now a national work, conceived and organized with sagacious intuition by Sister Milcent in 1902. In this field also fall the Association of the Daughters of Mary, which stems from St. Catherine Labouré (v.), with about 300,000 members and 4,000 branches, that of the Angels, of the Miraculous Medal, of the Luises, of the Oratories, etc. Foreign missions also occupy a place of honor, and currently the Company has 4,339 missionary sisters spread across Asia, Africa, and Oceania. Some of them have sealed their ministry of charity with martyrdom. Also noteworthy in the 19th century are the apparitions of the Miraculous Medal to St. Catherine Labouré (1830), of the Green Scapular to Sister Justine Bisqueyburu (1840), and of the Scapular of the Passion to Sister Apolline Andrievau (1846).
The organization and aims of the D. of C. served as a model for other Companies founded in more recent times.
Currently (1949), the D. of C. form the largest female religious institute in the Church, with about 45,000 sisters, 4,000 houses, divided into 33 provinces. – See pl. LXXXIV.
---
DAUGHTERS OF THE CHURCH. – A religious congregation founded in Venice in 1940 by Sister Maria Oliva del Corpo Mistico and canonically erected by the Cardinal Patriarch on April 21, 1946. It received the decree of praise from the Holy See on December 21, 1949.
At present, in 12 houses, all in Italy, 150 religious women live, dedicated to sustaining and fostering public adoration and to assisting parish priests in their spiritual and social ministry.
TEMP.: Anon., Oda della Madre di Dio, Figlia della Chiesa, 2nd ed. Rome 1950; Gabriele di S. M. Maddalena, Le F. della C. in Rivista di vita spirituale, 4 (1950), pp. 42-52. Silverio Mattei