St. Vincent de Paul

His life

Vincent was born to peasant farmers in Pouy, France, educated by the Franciscans, entered seminary at fifteen and was ordained in 1600. In 1605 Turkish pirates seized him and sold him into slavery; after two years he escaped with his master and his master's wife, whom he had helped convert back to the faith. Early on he was ambitious to provide for his family and rise in the Church, but he channeled those desires into leading the elite to serve the needy. He helped found seminaries, reform religious orders, counsel the king, and fight Jansenism. He also helped form and reform clergy and was a renowned confessor.

The Vincentian family

• The Congregation of the Mission (Vincentians), founded in 1625 but rooted in a homily at Folleville in 1617; today about four thousand priests and brothers in eighty countries.
• The Ladies of Charity, begun in 1617 as the Confraternities of Charity; today the International Association of Charity, with more than 250,000 members.
• The Daughters of Charity, founded with St. Louise de Marillac in 1633, whose motto is "The charity of Jesus crucified impels us."
• The Sisters of Charity, founded by St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Emmitsburg, Maryland, in 1809.
• The Society of St. Vincent de Paul, founded by Bl. Frédéric Ozanam in Paris in 1833, with more than 850,000 members in 150 countries, providing food, clothing, housing and often help with rent and utilities.

Clement XII canonized him in 1737.

Saints beget saints

St. Francis de Sales helped make Vincent "more gentle and loveable." Vincent inspired Ozanam, Seton, and Bl. Rosalie Rendu, a Daughter of Charity who served the poorest in Paris. St. Catherine Labouré dreamed at nineteen of an old priest who told her, "One day you will be happy to come to me. God has designs on you!" Years later she saw his portrait in a Daughters of Charity house and learned he was their founder, St. Vincent de Paul. She joined them, and in Paris received the apparitions of Mary that gave the world the Miraculous Medal. Her incorrupt body lies in the chapel on the Rue du Bac.

Legacy

Popes from Clement XII to Leo XIII praised his holiness. When his body was exhumed, his heart was found incorrupt, a sign of the love that marked his life.