LOUISE DE MARILLAC, Saint. - Cofoundress of the Daughters of Charity (v.); b. in Paris on 12 Aug. 1591, d. there on 15 March 1660.

In 1613 she became the wife of Antoine Le Gras, but having been left a widow in 1625, she devoted herself more fully to a life of devotion, in which she was directed by Bishop Jean-Pierre Camus, the great disciple of St. Francis de Sales (in 1610, in a painful spiritual trial, she had been guided by the Bishop of Geneva); by Camus, as early as 1624, she was put in contact with St. Vincent de Paul (v.), of whose works of charity she soon became one of the principal collaborators. From 1633, indeed, she began to take into her own house certain young women, like her occupied with the good conduct of those many initiatives; the association, distinguished by a modest gray habit that earned it the popular name of "sœurs grises," obtained in 1646 diocesan recognition as the Confraternity of the "Daughters of Charity," and received its definitive statutes in 1655, soon acquiring wide diffusion. The foundress, who always remained at the head of the house of Paris, continued to devote herself with the greatest self-denial to the care of the sick until her death. She was beatified by Benedict XV on 9 May 1920; canonized by Pius XI on 11 March 1934. Feast on 15 March.

Bibliography6 works

BIBL.: N. Gobillon, La vie de mille Le Gras, fondatrice et première supérieure de la Compagnie des Filles de la charité (Paris 1676; new edition, with an addition by Collet, ibid. 1769). A broader and more complete historical work is that of Msgr. L. Baunard, La vénérable Louise de M., Mlle Le Gras, fondatrice des Filles de la charité de St Vincent de Paul, Paris 1898; see also E. de Broglie, La vénérable Louise de M., ibid. 1911; P. Coste, Le grand saint du grand siècle: M. Vincent, 3 vols., ibid. 1932, passim; A. Troisi, Vita di s. L. di M., Rome 1934; J. Calvet, St Vincent de Paul, ibid. 1948, p. 127 ff.

Enzo Bottasso

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Louise de Marillac, Saint

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