GALLIFET, JOSEPH-FRANÇOIS de. - Jesuit theologian and promoter of devotion to the Sacred Heart, born at Aix on 3 May 1663, died at Lyons on 19 September 1749. He entered the novitiate at Avignon in 1678, where his spiritual director was the Blessed Claude de la Colombière, from whom he imbibed the zeal for the cult of the Sacred Heart that became the hallmark of his life. After ordination and recovery from a mortal illness through a vow made to the pious Fr. Croiset, he dedicated himself entirely to the cause of the Sacred Heart, erecting chapels in its honour at Grenoble and Besançon and founding confraternities in several French cities.
GALLIENO - Marble bust (11th century, from Gortyn, now in the Museum of Heraklion).
During his Roman sojourn (1724–30, when he served as Assistant for France to the General of the Society of Jesus), he composed the classic treatise *De cultu Sacrosancti Cordis ac Domini nostri Iesu Christi in variis christiani orbis provinciis iam propagato* (Rome 1726), which was soon translated into several languages. He himself prepared the French edition under the title *De l’excellence de la dévotion au Cœur adorable de Jésus Christ* (Lyons 1733). With this work he resolved all the objections that had seemed to block the institution of a liturgical feast in honour of the Sacred Heart, a feast that in 1725 had been requested for the third time by the Visitandines, supported by the kings of Spain and Poland and by the queen of France. The Sacred Congregation of Rites gave a negative response, but this did not dampen Gallifet’s ardour. Before leaving Rome he founded a confraternity of the Sacred Heart in the church of S. Teodoro, which kept the devotion alive throughout September until the triumph of the idea under the pontificates of Clement XIII and Pius VI. In 1743, at the request of Benedict XIV, he defended the *Mémoire* on divine communications concerning devotion to the Sacred Heart, drawn up by St Margaret Mary Alacoque. He also wrote a small but influential pamphlet, *De cultu immaculati cordis Mariae*, which was reprinted many times, and concluded his enlightened apostolate by publishing various spiritual works.