LYONNARD, JEAN. - Jesuit, writer on asceticism, b. at Remoulin (diocese of Nîmes) on 27 Dec. 1819, d. at Vals (Le Puy) on 9 Jan. 1887.
He adopted as the particular form of his own asceticism and as the aim of his ministries the apostolate through the sanctification of suffering, especially on behalf of the dying. He therefore spread the Archconfraternities of the Agonizing Heart and, in order to exercise a more regular and continuous action, founded, with the cooperation of Madame Trapadoux, the Institute of the Religious of the Agonizing Heart (1859), and propagated his idea through his writings.
Besides the numerous articles composed for the Messager du S. Coeur de Jésus, he wrote his principal work, very frequently republished and translated: L'apostolat de la souffrance (Paris 1865, Italian trans. Turin 1942), preceded and followed by others: Dévotion au Coeur agonisant de Jésus (Avignon 1850); Dévotion au Coeur compatissant de Marie (ibid. 1850); Le Coeur agonisant de Jésus et les agonisants de chaque jour (Paris 1852); L'intercession perpétuelle au Coeur compatissant de Marie pour les quatre-vingt-mille agonisants, qui meurent, chaque jour (ibid. 1867); L'oeuvre du salut des mourants (Le Puy 1883).