GAUTRELET, FRANÇOIS-XAVIER. - Jesuit, b. 15 Feb. 1807 at Sampigny (Saône-et-Loire), d. 1 July 1886 at Montluçon. Spiritual director of the scholasticate of Vals (1842-52), on the feast of St. Francis Xavier in 1848 he launched the first idea of the Apostleship of Prayer (v.), developing the thesis, later deepened theologically by Fr. Ramière, that the apostolate is exercised indeed by word and action, but even more by prayer and sacrifice. The idea was then spread by G. through the pamphlet L'apostolat de la prière and further given concrete form with the approval of Fr. Roothaan in the association of the same name.
In 1852 he was appointed rector at Vals, in 1855 instructor of the third probation at Fourvière, provincial of Lyon (1857-61), then he went to Algeria as superior general of the mission. In 1865 he was visitor and then superior of the mission of Syria, he prepared the way for the founding of the University of Beirut, developed the Catholic press with the Arabic edition of Holy Scripture and the newspaper Le Béchir. In 1869 he was recalled to Fourvière, and after having been rector of the College of Lyon, he took over the direction of the Parisian review Etudes (1876). G. left many ascetical pamphlets, among which many editions were had by the Manuel de la dévotion au Sacré Coeur (Paris 1850); the Traité de l'état religieux (2 vols., Lyon 1847); Le prêtre à l'autel (ibid. 1874).
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Arnaldo M. Lanz