Visitation

VISITATION. - Religious order, called of the Visitandines or of the V.

I. HISTORY

The V. was the joint work of St. Francis de Sales (v.) and St. Jane de Chantal (v.). It was founded on June 6, 1610, at Annecy. St. Francis's design was to open in this way the path of perfection to women too advanced in years or too weak to endure the cloister. And he gave his institution a double purpose: on the one hand contemplation, in order to practice charity toward God, and on the other the visiting of the poor and the sick, in order to practice charity toward one's neighbor. Hence the name of V. chosen for the new Order, which was to be nothing other than a congregation with simple vows. And so indeed matters proceeded for five years, but in 1615, wishing to found a second house of the Institute at Lyon, St. Francis had to consult the archbishop of Lyon, Msgr. de Marquemont, who was frightened by the boldness of the work, since, in his view, a community of religious women could live only in enclosure. St. Francis yielded to this idea, and suppressed the assistance to the sick; he accepted the enclosure and made new Constitutions for his religious. The Visitandines kept their name, but became a cloistered Order, approved by Paul V on Oct. 6, 1618. From that moment the vows were solemn and, by a privilege unheard of until then, the Visitandines replaced the canonical Office with the little Office of the Blessed Virgin, as more suited to their health. The Rule adopted was that of St. Augustine.

II. EXPANSION

The new Order spread rapidly. During the very lifetime of St. Francis de Sales (d. 1622), monasteries were founded at Annecy, Lyon, Grenoble, Paris, Montferrand, Nevers, Orléans, Valence, Dijon, Belley and Saint-Etienne. At the death of St. Jane de Chantal, in 1641, there were 87 houses of the Visitandines. After her death the Order established itself in Poland, in the Netherlands, in Bavaria, in Germany, in Austria and in Lebanon. It already existed, before 1641, in Switzerland and in Italy. In the course of the 18th century the V. reached its apogee with 200 monasteries, distributed throughout all the Christian countries. After the French Revolution it resumed its momentum. At the end of the 19th century it had ca. 190 monasteries, with ca. 7000 religious. From this epoch the recruitment of religious declined. In 1925, the houses were 169, of which 63 in France, 29 in Italy, 17 in Spain, 20 in Canada and the United States, 9 in Belgium and Holland, 12 in South America, 7 in Germany, 3 in Austria, 2 in England, 2 in Switzerland, 3 in Poland and 2 in Syria. At present the number of houses has decreased still further, and the measures taken to group the monasteries into provinces so as to sustain them through the rotation of personnel do not appear to have yet yielded the hoped-for results.

III. STANDARD OF LIVING AND SPIRIT OF THE ORDER

The Order comprises choir nuns, converse sisters and portress sisters. The spirit of the Order was summarized by Pope Pius XI in the letter he wrote for the third centenary of the death of St. Francis de Sales, in 1922: "There, no long vigils nor long psalmody, no penances nor harsh expiations, but obedience to laws so gentle and so easy that even the weakest nuns can carry out all their provisions without fatigue. But these easy and pleasant actions must be inflamed by the fire of charity; and so the religious... attain total self-denial, the humblest obedience, and, pursuing virtues that are not noisy but solid, die to themselves in order to live in God."

Leone Cristiani