Jeanne Françoise Frémyot naquit à Dijon le 23 janvier 1572. Orpheline de mère à dix-huit mois, elle reçut de son père, second Président au Parlement de Bourgogne, une éducation forte et brillante, profondément chrétienne. « Dès son jeûne âge l'on remarqua en elle des indices particuliers de la grâce divine, et entre autres une modestie fort majestueuse et une aversion si incomparable aux hérétiques, que si quelqu'un d'eux la voulait toucher ou porter entre ses bras, elle ne cessait de crier qu'il ne l'eût posée. Elle apprenait avec une grande souplesse et vivacité d'esprit tout ce qu'on lui enseignait, et on l'instruisait de tout ce qui est convenable à une demoiselle de sa condition et de son bon esprit : à lire, écrire, danser, sonner des instruments, chanter en musique, faire des ouvrages... »1
Le 29 décembre 1592, elle épousa Christophe II de Rabutin, baron de Chantal. « Ce fut un des plus accomplis mariages qui aient été vus, l'un et l'autre partis étant parfaitement doués de corps et d'esprit, des plus aimables qualités, recommandables en la noblesse. Quant à notre bienheureuse Mère, elle était de riche taille, d'un port généreux et majestueux, sa face ornée de grâces et d'une beauté naturelle fort attrayantes sans artifice et sans mollesse ; son humeur vive et gaie, son esprit clair, prompt et net, son jugement solide ; il n'y avait rien en elle de changeant ni de léger. Bref, elle était telle qu'on la surnomma la dame parfaite... Elle ne portait que du camelot et de l’étamine, et cela avec tant de propreté, de grâce et de bienséance, qu'elle paraissait cent fois plus que plusieurs autres qui ruinent leurs maisons, pour porter des affiquets... Cette femme diligente fut une couronne à son mari Le cœur duquel se fiant en elle entreprit avec joie et générosité de régler sa maison.2 »
Pendant neuf ans ils vécurent un très grand bonheur au château de Bourbilly, jusqu'à ce jour de 1601 où Monsieur de Chantal mourut des suites d'un accident de chasse. Jeanne se retrouva seule, à vingt-huit ans, avec quatre jeunes enfants3. Sa douleur était immense. Un événement décisif orienta toute sa vie : la rencontre, en 1604, de saint François de Sales venu prêcher le carême à Dijon où le président de Frémyot avait invité sa fille. « Elle faisait mettre son siège à l’opposite de la chaire du prédicateur pour le voir et ouïr plus à souhait. Le saint prélat, de son côté, bien qu’attentif à son discours, remarquait cette veuve par-dessus toutes les autres dames4. » Le frère de la baronne de Chantal qui était archevêque de Bourges5, la présenta à François de Sales ; ce fut le point de départ d'un ardent amour de Dieu et d'un dépouillement radical qui la conduiront à une haute union à Dieu. Entre Jeanne de Chantal et François de Sales se noua une profonde relation, faite d'une totale et affectueuse confiance mutuelle. Elle ne tarda pas à lui confier son désir d'être toute à Dieu. Mais ses responsabilités familiales la retenaient.
Peu à peu, cependant, les obstacles tombèrent6 ; en 1610, elle quitta Dijon pour aller inaugurer à Annecy une nouvelle forme de vie religieuse dont François de Sales était le fondateur : la Visitation. Un double aspect caractérisait le jeune institut : une vie de prière intense et le service des malades. Fait unique à l'époque : ces religieuses n'étaient pas cloîtrées, ce qui fit l'étonnement des malveillants. En 1619, François de Sales dut supprimer la visite aux malades, et la Visitation devint un ordre cloîtré.
1617 fut pour Jeanne de Chantal une année d’épreuves : son gendre mourut à Turin (23 mai), suivi de Marie-Aimée, après un accouchement prématuré (16 septembre). Sur son lit de mort, Marie-Aimée prit l'habit de la Visitation et prononça ses vœux entre les mains de saint François de Sales. La Mère de Chantal, qui avait commencé à souffrir de maux étranges dès 1610 et avait été de nouveau malade en 1615 et 1616, se vit à toute extrémité à la fin de 1617 ; elle guérit à la suite d'un vœu à saint Charles Borromée. Une fois remise, elle partit fonder une Visitation à Grenoble (8 avril 1618), préparée par les prédications de l'évêque de Genève. A l’automne, elle commence un voyage de quatre ans loin d'Annecy. Après la fondation du monastère de Bourges (15 novembre), François de Sales l'appela à Paris où elle resta du 7 avril 1619 au 21 février 1622, s'occupant des débuts de la nouvelle Visitation (l° mai 1619), négociant le mariage de sa fille Françoise avec Antoine de Toulongeon, surveillant les fondations de Montferrand (7 juin 1620), de Nevers (21 juillet), d’Orléans (9 septembre), de Valence (8 juin 1621). Après quelques jours passés à Maubuisson avec Angélique Arnauld et un pèlerinage au tombeau de Marie de l'Incarnation au carmel de Pontoise, elle partit pour la fondation de Dijon (8 mai 1622), par Orléans, Bourges, Nevers et Moulins. Fin octobre, elle était à Lyon où François de Sales lui commanda d'aller visiter les monastères de Montferrand et de Saint-Étienne (établi le 1° octobre). Le 11 décembre, à Lyon, eut lieu le dernier entretien des deux fondateurs, et la Mère repartit aussitôt visiter d'autres monastères. Elle n'apprit la mort de son père spirituel, survenue le 28 décembre 1622, que le 6 janvier 1623 à Belley d’où elle rentra à Annecy pour s'occuper du corps de François de Sales et de ses funérailles.
Désormais Jeanne de Chantal gouverna seule les treize monastères de la Visitation où les vocations affluaient. Elle se démit de son supériorat après l'Ascension 1623 et n'accepta d'être réélue que pour trois ans. Désirant se plier en tout à la Règle comme la plus humble des religieuses, elle ne voulut jamais du titre de mère générale, reprenant après chaque déposition le dernier rang. Cependant son influence spirituelle et morale était immense et incontestée. Rien ne se décidait sans elle. Elle fonda les Visitations de Chambéry (14 janvier 1624), d’Evian (6 août 1625), de Rumilly (29 septembre) et de Pont-à-Mousson (6 mai 1626). En 1627, elle eut la joie de l'ouverture du procès de béatification de François de Sales, et la peine de la mort de Celse-Bénigne, tué au combat de l'Ile de Ré (22 juillet)7. A l'automne 1627, elle fonda la Visitation de Cremieu (21 septembre) et visita les monastères de Paris, d'Orléans et d'Auvergne. En 1634, elle fonda une seconde maison à Annecy pour accueillir l'afflux des postulantes. En juin 1635, pour conférer de l'avenir de son ordre avec les évêques réunis à l'Assemblée du clergé de France, elle gagna Paris où elle passa l'hiver.
Chaque monastère étant placé directement sous l'autorité de l'évêque du diocèse, des amis de la Visitation s'inquiétèrent des moyens de maintenir, dans l'avenir, l'union et l’uniformité entre tant de maisons. A l'occasion de l'Assemblée du clergé, en 1635, se tint une réunion de quelques évêques, avec saint Vincent de Paul, supérieur des Visitations de Paris8, et le commandeur de Sillery9. Appelée à donner son avis, la Mère de Chantal fit nettement comprendre que la volonté formelle du fondateur avait été de laisser les monastères sous l'autorité des évêques, sans supérieure générale, et d'établir « non un moyen d'union d'autorité, mais de charité » entre eux et avec le premier monastère d'Annecy, « estant le dépositaire principal de l'esprit de l'Institut, et de la tradition du sens de la Règle, et des statuts, pour avoir esté réglé et formé par le Fondateur10. » Les prélats se rangèrent à cet avis et approuvèrent le Coutumier avec les additions proposées.
Le problème des moyens d'union entre les monastères ne se régla pas si facilement que semble le dire la préface du Coutumier de 1637. Peu après, en effet, Octave de Bellegarde11 (archevêque de Sens), Vincent de Paul et le commandeur de Sillery proposèrent de demander l’établissement d'un visiteur apostolique. La Mère de Chantal en sentait l'opportunité, d'autant plus que Rome avait failli l'imposer d'office, en 1637, à la suite de rapports faits par des jésuites contre l'ordre pour accuser les supérieures et maîtresses des novices de gêner la libre communication des sœurs avec les confesseurs. De plus, c'était une idée de François de Sales mais, selon lui, le visiteur ne devait agir que par l'autorité des évêques afin de ne pas porter atteinte à leurs prérogatives. La Mère de Chantal maintint fortement cette position et se trouva ainsi en désaccord sur ce point avec Vincent de Paul qui désirait des pouvoirs étendus pour le visiteur. Jeanne de Chantal ne voulait que mettre en œuvre les intentions du fondateur, mais il fallut bien interpréter et compléter pour faire face à des situations nouvelles. Elle le fit avec sa personnalité profondément originale, son bon sens pratique et sa profonde connaissance de la psychologie féminine. Il ne fut plus jamais question de visiteur apostolique.
Au printemps 1636, elle reprit la route pour Troyes, Marseille et Montpellier. A l'automne 1638, elle fonda la Visitation de Turin (21 novembre). Le 11 avril 1641, elle se démit de sa charge de supérieure avec l'intention de ne plus jamais la reprendre. Recrue d'épreuves et de deuils, elle aspirait au repos. Or la duchesse de Montmorency12 voulut prendre le voile à la Visitation de Moulins des mains de son amie la Mère de Chantal qui se mit en route le 28 juillet. En août, elle était à Moulins où Anne d'Autriche13 lui envoya une litière pour la conduire à Saint-Germain-en-Laye où elle désirait s'entretenir avec elle. De Paris, elle regagna Moulins où, en arrivant, elle dut s'aliter (8 décembre). Jeanne de Chantal mourut paisiblement, le 13 décembre 1641, après avoir dicté ses dernières recommandations à ses filles de la Visitation. Elle laissait l'ordre solidement établi avec quatre-vingt-sept monastères. Son corps fut ramené à Annecy (30 décembre) et inhumé dans l'église de la Visitation. la Mère Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal fut béatifiée par Benoît XIV le 21 novembre 1751. Le procès de béatification n’avait commencé qu’en 1722 et les du procès avait été retardée par plusieurs difficultés D'une part, une fausse interprétation du décret d'Urbain VIII avait fait négliger de recueillir dans les formes les dépositions des témoins quand il en était encore temps ; d'autre part, les réaction anti-mystique et antijanséniste, qui sévissait dans les milieux romains, la soupçonnait de quiétisme et de sympathies jansénistes. Elle fut canonisée par Clément XIII le 16 juillet 1767.
● ● ●
1 Mère Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy : Mémoire sur la vie et les vertus de Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal.
2 Mère Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy : Mémoire sur la vie et les vertus de Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal.
3 Ils eurent six enfants dont deux fils moururent en bas âge. Il resta Celse-Bénigne (né en 1596, le père de la marquise de Sévigné), Marie-Aimée (née en 1598), Françoise (née en 1599) et Charlotte (née en 1601, quinze jours avant la mort de son père).
4 Mère Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy : Mémoire sur la vie et les vertus de Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal.
5 André Frémyot, né à Dijon le 26 août 1573 ; sa naissance coûta la vie à sa mère. Il fit ses études à Paris. Encore sous-diacre (1602), il fut élu archevêque Bourges (sacré à Saint-Denis-du-Pas de Paris, le 7 décembre 1603). Démissionnaire en 1621, il reçut en commende les abbayes de Breteuil et de Ferrières et le prieuré de Nogent-le-Rotrou. Ami de François de Sales, il fut un des trois commissaires apostoliques nommés par Urbain VIII pour l’enquête canonique (1627). Il mourut à Paris le 13 mai 1641.
6 Marie-Aimée est mariée à Bernard de Sales, frère de saint François de Sales (13 octobre 1609). Charlotte meurt à la fin de janvier 1610. Celse-Bénigne est confié à son grand-père avant de commencer une carrière à la cour.
7 Celse-Bénigne, de son mariage avec Marie de Coulanges, laissait une petite fille qui deviendra la marquise de Sévigné.
8 Saint Vincent de Paul, à la demande de saint François de Sales, de sainte Jeanne de Chantal et de l’évêque de Paris fut nommé supérieur des trois monastères parisiens de la Visitation depuis leur fondation, charge qu’il garda jusqu’en 1660.
9 Frère du chancelier Nicolas de Sillery, Noël Brûlart de Sillery, destiné dès l’enfance à la vie religieuse, fut reçu dans l'ordre de Saint-Jean-de-Jérusalem (1596) et, au retour de Malte, il reçut la commanderie de Troyes (1600). Appelé par son frère à la Cour, il eut la faveur d'Henri IV et de Marie de Médicis dont il devint le premier écuyer puis le chevalier d'honneur. Il effectua des ambassades en Espagne et à Rome, où « en quittant cette capitale du monde chrétien, il emporta le nom d’ambassadeur aussi dévot que magnifique. » En 1624, à la disgrâce de son frère il renonça à la vie publique. A l'occasion d'un jubilé, il rencontra Vincent de Paul auquel il fit une confession générale et sous la direction duquel il se plaça. C'est sans doute sur ses conseils qu’il se rendit à la Visitation du faubourg Saint-Jacques, mais ce fut un échec : « Quoy qu'il remarqua beaucoup de perfection, et toute la vertu qu'il pouvoit souhaiter à la supérieure et aux religieuses qu'il vit, ce n'estoit point cependant ce qu’il cherchoit pour s'y attacher. » Il vint pour la première fois au monastère de la rue Saint-Antoine, le 28 décembre 1630, pour entendre un panégyrique de François de Sales par le curé de Saint-Jean-en-Grève. Hélène-Angelique Lhuillier, la supérieure, lui consacra par la suite de nombreuses heures d'entretien et entreprit de travailler à son édification spirituelle comme de lutter contre son amour de la gloire et des richesses. Lorsqu'il se fit prêtre en 1634, il choisit de dire sa première messe (13 avril) dans la modeste chapelle de la rue Saint-Antoine. Pour s'associer davantage aux prières des visitandines, le commandeur vint s'établir définitivement dans l'hôtel du Petit-Bourbon où il vécut jusqu'à sa mort. Parmi ses bienfaits à l'égard de la Visitation, l'histoire a surtout retenu la construction de l'église de la rue Saint-Antoine, mais sa générosité alla aussi à d'autres maisons de l'ordre. Il mourut à Pa¬ris le 26 septembre 1640 et fut inhumé au monastère de la Visitation.
10 Préface du Coutumier de 1637.
11 Octave de Saint-Lary de Bellegarde naquit à Brouage en Périgord, en juillet 1587, quelques mois avant que son père (César, duc de Bellegarde et gouverneur de Saintonge) ne mourut de blessures reçues à la bataille de Coutras. Il étudia à Bordeaux et à Toulouse puis à la Sorbonne (1606). Destiné à l’état ecclésiastique, il fut pourvu de bonne heure de bénéfices (les abbayes de Saint-Mélaine de Rennes, et de Nisors, la domerie de Notre-Darne d'Aubrat). Son oncle lui céda l’abbaye de Saint-Germain d'Auxerre où il fit profession. Aumônier ordinaire d’Henri IV (1607), abbé de Pothières (1610), il fut nommé évêque de Couserans en 1612. Le 14 novembre 1621, il était appelé à l'archevêché de Sens. Pendant un quart de siècle, tout à sa mission de chef de diocèse, il veilla avec un dévouement absolu aux intérêts spirituels et temporels de son Église. Plein de sollicitude pour l'observation des lois canoniques et pour la restauration de la discipline, il laissa la réputation d’ardente piété et d'une grande douceur. Il installa les visitandines à Provins, à Montargis et à Melun. Il mourut dans sa maison de Montreuil (près de Paris) le 26 juillet 1646. Il couronnait une vie toute de dignité et de zèle par un testament laissant tout ce qu'il possédait aux pauvres et à son Église. Son corps, rapporté à Sens, fut inhumé dans le sanctuaire de sa cathédrale.
12 La princesse Marie-Félicité des Ursin avait épousé en 1615 Henri II, duc de Montmorency et d’Amville, pair de France, premier baron, amiral et maréchal de France, gouverneur du Languedoc. Révolté contre Louis XIII et le cardinal de Richelieu, le duc fut battu à Castelnaudary ; pris et jugé, il fut décapité à Toulouse (1632). Après l’exécution de son époux, la duchesse de Montmorency fut assignée à résidence à Moulins où elle fit construire une église pour les religieuses de la Visitation dans laquelle elle fit élever le mausolée de son mari. Elle prit le voile et fut supérieure du monastère. Elle mourut en 1666.
13 La Reine, habituée de la Visitation du faubourg Saint-Jacques, avait favorisé la fondation de la Visitation de Saint-Denis (1638) ; plus tard (1648) elle mit sous sa protection la fondation de la Visitation de Compiègne.
SOURCE :
http://voiemystique.free.fr/jeanne_de_chantal_1.htmActe
d'abandon
O bonté souveraine de la souveraine providence de mon
Dieu, je me délaisse pour jamais entre vos bras ; soit que vous me soyez
douce ou rigoureuse, menez-moi désormais par où il vous plaira. Je ne
regarderai point les chemins par où vous me ferez passer, mais vous, ô mon
Dieu, qui me conduisez ; mon cœur ne trouve point de repos hors des bras
et du sein de cette céleste Providence, ma vraie mère, ma force et mon
rempart ; c'est pourquoi je me résous moyennant votre aide divine, ô mon
Sauveur, de suivre vos désirs et ordonnances sans jamais regarder où éplucher
les causes pourquoi vous faites ceci plutôt que cela, mais à yeux clos je vous
suivrai selon vos volontés divines sans rechercher mon propre goût ; c'est
à quoi je me détermine de laisser tout faire à Dieu, ne me mêlant que de me
tenir en repos entre ses bras, sans désirer chose quelconque, que selon qu'il
m'incitera à désirer, à vouloir et à souhaiter.
Je vous offre ce désir, ô mon Dieu, vous suppliant de
le bénir, entreprenant le tout appuyé sur votre bonté, libéralité et
miséricorde, en la totale confiance en vous et défiance de moi et de mon
infinie misère et infirmité.
Amen
Sainte Jeanne de Chantal
Il
y a trois façons de faire oraison
La première se fait en nous servant de
l'imagination, nous représentant le divin Jésus en la crèche, entre les bras de
sa sainte Mère et du grand saint Joseph ; le regardant entre un bœuf et
un âne ; puis voir comme sa divine Mère l'expose dans la crèche, puis comme
elle le reprend pour lui donner son lait virginal et nourrir ce Fils qui est
son créateur et son Dieu. Mais il ne faut pas se bander l'esprit à vouloir, sur
tout ceci, faire des imaginations particulières, nous voulant figurer comme ce
sacré Poupon avait les yeux et comme sa bouche était faite ; mais nous
représenter tout simplement le mystère. Cette façon de méditer est bonne pour
celles [ les personnes ] qui ont encore l'esprit des pensées du monde, afin que
l'imagination, étant remplie de ces objets, rechasse toute autre pensée.
La deuxième façon, c'est de nous servir de la
considération, nous représentant les vertus que Notre-Seigneur a pratiquées :
son humilité, sa patience, sa douceur, sa charité à l'endroit de ses ennemis,
et ainsi des autres. En ces considérations, notre volonté se sentira tout émue
en Dieu et produira de fortes affections, desquelles nous devons tirer des
résolutions pour la pratique de chaque jour, tâchant toujours de battre sur les
passions et inclinations par lesquelles nous sommes les plus sujettes à
faillir.
La troisième façon, c'est de nous tenir
simplement en la présence de Dieu, le regardant des yeux de la foi en quelque
mystère, nous entretenant avec lui par des paroles pleines de confiance, cœur à
cœur, mais si secrètement, comme si nous ne voulions pas que notre bon ange le
sût. Lorsque vous vous trouverez sèche, qu'il vous semblera que vous ne pourrez
pas dire une seule parole, ne laissez pas de lui parler, et dites : Seigneur,
je suis une pauvre terre sèche, sans eau ; donnez à ce pauvre cœur votre grâce.
Puis demeurez en respect en sa présence, sans jamais vous troubler ni inquiéter
pour aucune sécheresse qui puisse arriver. Cette manière d'oraison est plus
sujette à distractions que celle de la considération, et, si nous nous rendons
bien fidèles, Notre-Seigneur donnera celle de l'union de notre âme avec lui.
Que chacune suive le chemin auquel elle est attirée.
Ces trois sortes d'oraison sont très bonnes : que donc
celles qui sont attirées à l'imagination la suivent, et de même celles qui le
sont à la considération et à la simplicité de la présence de Dieu ; mais,
néanmoins, pour cette troisième sorte, il faut bien se garder de s'y
porter de soi-même, si Dieu ne nous y attire.
Ste Jeanne de Chantal
SOURCE : http://missel.free.fr/Sanctoral/08/12.php
Noël Hallé. Saint
François de Sales donnant à Sainte Jeanne de Chantal la règle de l'ordre de la
Visitation
Sainte Jeanne-Françoise de
Chantal
Veuve et Fondatrice de :
“Ordo Visitationis Beatissimae Mariae Virginis”
(Ordre de la Visitation...)
(1572-1641)
Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy, nièce de la Mère de Chantal, évoque
« l'humeur vive et gaie » de sa tante, « son esprit clair,
prompt et net, son jugement solide ». Ces qualités humaines devaient
rendre Sainte Jeanne-Françoise de Chantal très efficace dans toute sa vie
d'épouse et de mère, puis de femme Consacrée.
Fille de magistrat, Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot, âgée de vingt ans, fut
donnée en mariage au baron de Chantal. Leur foyer, où naquirent quatre enfants,
connut huit années de bonheur profond, que vint interrompre brutalement un
accident de chasse (1600).
Le baron, blessé, mourut pieusement quelques jours après. Jeanne avait
vingt-huit ans ; dans sa douleur, elle se confia toute à Dieu.
C'est alors que Le Seigneur mit François de Sales sur sa route. Dès
lors, elle se mit sous sa direction. Avec patience et fermeté, l'Évêque de
Genève conduisit Jeanne-Françoise à une perfection supérieure :
« J'ai trouvé à Dijon, pouvait dire le Saint, la femme forte, en Mme de
Chantal. »
Le Saint Évêque donna à la future Sainte cette parole qui devrait conduire
toute sa vie : « Il faut tout faire par Amour, et rien par
force ; il faut plus aimer l'obéissance que craindre la
désobéissance. »
En 1610, vint l'heure des adieux héroïques de Madame de Chantal à son
père et à ses enfants.
Elle devint Fondatrice de l'Ordre de la Visitation, Ordre qui allie
Contemplation et service des malades. Alors commencèrent à travers la France
les voyages incessants pour fonder des maisons à l'image de celle d'Annecy.
La Sainte Fondatrice mourut à Moulins le 13 Décembre 1641.
L'amour de Dieu possédait son âme au point qu'elle n'en pouvait supporter
l'ardeur. « Ah ! disait-elle, si le monde connaissait la douceur
d'aimer Dieu, il mourrait d'Amour ! ».
Leçons des Matines avant 1960.
Au deuxième nocturne.
Quatrième leçon. Jeanne-Françoise Frémiot de Chantal naquit à Dijon, en Bourgogne, d’une illustre famille, et donna, dès son enfance, des signes non équivoques d’une grande sainteté. A peine âgée de cinq ans, elle réfuta, dit-on, les erreurs d’un noble calviniste avec une solidité d’arguments au-dessus de son âge, et jeta au feu un petit présent que cet homme lui avait offert, en disant : « Voilà comment brûleront en enfer, les hérétiques qui refusent de croire à la parole de Jésus-Christ. » Sa mère étant morte, elle se mit sous la protection de la sainte Vierge, et renvoya une de ses suivantes qui cherchait à lui inspirer du goût pour le monde. Rien dans sa conduite ne dénotait l’enfant ; remplie d’aversion pour les plaisirs du siècle et ne soupirant qu’après le martyre, elle se donnait tout entière aux œuvres de religion et de piété. Lorsque son père l’eut mariée au baron de Chantal, on la vit appliquée à la pratique de toutes les vertus, pleine de zèle vis-à-vis de ses enfants, de ses serviteurs et de ceux qui étaient sous sa dépendance, pour les instruire des principes de la foi et les former aux bonnes mœurs. Elle soulageait les besoins des pauvres avec une très grande libéralité, et bien souvent la providence divine multiplia ses provisions ; aussi promit-elle de ne jamais rien refuser à quiconque lu i demanderait l’aumône au nom de Jésus-Christ.
Cinquième leçon. Après la mort de son mari, causée par un accident de chasse, elle se mit à pratiquer une vie plus parfaite et se lia par le vœu de chasteté. Outre qu’elle supporta courageusement la mort de son mari, elle voulut encore donner au meurtrier une marque publique de pardon, en triomphant d’elle-même jusqu’à vouloir être la marraine de son fils. Elle se contenta d’une domesticité peu nombreuse, d’une nourriture grossière et de vêtements communs, et fit passer à de pieux usages ses parures précieuses. Tout le temps qui lui restait après le soin de sa maison, elle l’employait à la prière, aux lectures pieuses et au travail. On ne put jamais l’amener à consentir à de secondes noces, bien qu’il se présentât des partis honorables et avantageux. Et de peur que, dans la suite, sa détermination de garder la chasteté ne fût ébranlée, elle renouvela son vœu et grava sur sa poitrine, au moyen d’un fer rouge, le très saint nom de Jésus-Christ. Enflammée d’une charité dont l’ardeur croissait chaque jour, elle se faisait amener les pauvres, les abandonnés, les malades et ceux qui se trouvaient affligés des maux les plus repoussants. Non contente de les recevoir chez elle, pour les consoler et les soigner, elle nettoyait leurs vêtements malpropres les raccommodait, et n’avait pas horreur d’approcher ses lèvres de leurs ulcères fétides et purulents.
Sixième leçon. Ayant appris, sous la direction spirituelle de saint François de Sales, à connaître la divine volonté, elle abandonna avec un invincible courage son père, son beau-père, et son propre fils. Et comme ce dernier s’opposait à la vocation de sa mère, celle-ci n’hésita point à passer sur son corps, en sortant de sa maison. Elle jeta alors les bases du saint institut de la Visitation de Sainte-Marie et en observa les règles dans toute son intégrité. Elle était éprise de la pauvreté au point de se réjouir de manquer même du nécessaire. Elle se montra un modèle accompli d’humilité, d’obéissance et de toutes les vertus chrétiennes. Préparant en son cœur des ascensions toujours plus hautes, elle s’astreignit par un vœu des plus difficiles à observer, à faire constamment ce qu’elle comprendrait être le plus parfait. Ce fut surtout grâce à elle que le pieux institut de la Visitation se répandit de tous côtés ; et c’est par des écrits remplis de la sagesse de Dieu, comme par ses paroles et ses exemples, qu’elle a excité ses sœurs à la piété et à la charité. Enfin, chargée de mérites et saintement munie des sacrements, elle mourut à Moulins, le treize décembre seize cent quarante et un. Saint Vincent de Paul, qui était alors éloigné, vit son âme reçue au ciel par saint François de Sales. On transféra dans la suite son corps à Annecy. Avant et après sa mort, des miracles l’ont rendue célèbre. Benoît XIV l’a béatifiée, et le souverain Pontife Clément XIII l’a inscrite au catalogue des Saints. Enfin, Clément XIV a ordonné que toute l’Église célébrerait sa Fête le douzième jour avant les calendes de septembre.
Au troisième nocturne. Du Commun.
Lecture du saint Évangile selon saint Matthieu. Cap. 13, 44-52.
En ce temps-là : Jésus dit à ses disciples cette parabole : Le royaume des cieux est semblable à un trésor caché dans un champ. Et le reste.
Homélie de saint Grégoire, Pape. Homilia 11 in Evangelia
Septième leçon. Si le Seigneur, mes très chers frères, nous dépeint le royaume des cieux comme semblable à des objets terrestres, c’est pour que notre esprit s’élève, de ce qu’il connaît, à ce qu’il ne connaît pas ; qu’il se porte vers les biens invisibles par l’exemple des choses visibles, et, qu’excité par des vérités dont il a l’expérience, il s’enflamme de telle sorte, que l’affection qu’il éprouve pour un bien connu lui apprenne à aimer aussi des biens inconnus. Voici « que le royaume des cieux est comparé à un trésor caché dans un champ ; celui qui l’a trouvé, le cache, et à cause de la joie qu’il en a, il va et vend tout ce qu’il a, et il achète ce champ » [1].
Huitième leçon. Il faut remarquer dans ce fait, que le trésor une fois trouvé, on le cache afin de le conserver. C’est parce que celui qui ne met pas à l’abri des louanges humaines l’ardeur des désirs qu’il ressent pour le ciel, ne parvient pas à les défendre contre les malins esprits. Nous sommes, en effet, dans la vie présente comme dans un chemin par lequel nous nous dirigeons vers la patrie ; et les esprits malins infestent notre route, comme le feraient des voleurs. C’est vouloir être dépouillé que de porter un trésor à découvert sur le chemin. Je ne dis pas cela, néanmoins, pour empêcher que le prochain soit témoin de nos bonnes œuvres, selon ce qui est écrit : « Qu’ils voient vos bonnes œuvres et qu’ils glorifient votre Père qui est dans les cieux » [2] ; mais afin que nous ne recherchions pas, dans le motif qui nous fait agir, les louanges du dehors. Que l’action soit publique, mais que notre intention demeure cachée, pour que nous donnions ainsi à notre prochain l’exemple d’une bonne œuvre, et cependant que par l’intention que nous avons de plaire uniquement à Dieu, nous souhaitions toujours le secret.
Neuvième leçon. Or, le trésor, c’est le désir du ciel, et le champ où est caché ce trésor, c’est une vie digne du ciel. Il vend bien tout ce qu’il a pour acheter ce champ, celui qui, renonçant aux voluptés charnelles, foule aux pieds tous ses désirs terrestres, par la pratique exacte de cette vie digne du ciel, en sorte que plus rien de ce qui flatte les sens ne lui plaise, et que son esprit ne redoute rien de ce qui détruit la vie charnelle.
[1] Matth. 13, 44.
[2] Matth. 5, 16.
Dom Guéranger, l’Année Liturgique
Bien que la gloire de Marie soit d’au dedans [3], sa beauté paraît aussi dans le vêtement qui l’entoure [4] : vêtement mystérieux, tissé des vertus des Saints qui lui doivent leur justice et leur récompense [5]. De même que toute grâce nous vient parla divine Mère, toute gloire au ciel converge vers celle de la Reine des cieux.
Or, entre les âmes bienheureuses, il en est de plus immédiatement rapprochées de la Vierge bénie [6]. Prévenues de la tendresse particulière de cette Mère de la grâce, elles laissèrent tout [7] pour courir sur la terre à l’odeur des parfums de l’Époux qu’elle a donné au monde [8] ; elles gardent au ciel avec Marie l’intimité plus grande qui fut déjà leur part au temps de l’exil. De là vient qu’à cette heure de son exaltation près du Fils de Dieu [9], le Psalmiste chante aussi les vierges pénétrant avec elle en allégresse dans le temple du Roi [10] ; le couronnement de Notre-Dame est véritablement la toute spéciale solennité de ces filles de Tyr [11], devenues elles mêmes princesses [12] et reines [13] afin de former son noble cortège et sa royale cour.
Si le diadème de la virginité n’orne pas le front de l’élue proposée aujourd’hui à notre vénération, elle est de celles pourtant qui méritèrent en leur humilité d’entendre un jour le céleste message : Écoute, ma fille, et vois, et incline l’oreille de ton cœur, et oublie ton peuple et la maison de ton père [14]. En réponse, tel fut son bienheureux élan dans les voies de l’amour, qu’on vit des vierges innombrables s’attacher à ses pas pour parvenir plus sûrement à l’Époux. A elle aussi revient en conséquence une place glorieuse dans le vêtement d’or, aux reflets multiples, dont resplendit en son triomphe la Reine des Saints [15].
Car quelle est la variété signalée par le Psaume dans les broderies et les franges de cette robe de gloire [16], sinon la diversité des nuances que revêt l’or delà divine charité parmi les élus ? C’est afin d’accentuer l’heureux effet provenant de cette diversité dans la lumière des Saints, que l’éternelle Sagesse a multiplié les formes sous lesquelles se présente au monde la vie des conseils. Tel est bien l’enseignement voulu par la sainte Liturgie dans le rapprochement des deux fêtes d’aujourd’hui et d’hier au Cycle sacré. De l’austérité cistercienne au renoncement plus intérieur de la Visitation Sainte-Marie, la distance paraît grande ; l’Église néanmoins réunit la mémoire de sainte Jeanne de Chantai et de l’Abbé de Clairvaux, en hommage à la bienheureuse Vierge, dans l’Octave fortunée qui consomme sa gloire ; c’est qu’en effet toutes les Règles de perfection s’accordent pour n’être, à l’honneur de Marie, que des variantes de l’unique Règle, celle de l’amour, dont la divine Mère présente en sa vie l’exemplaire premier.
« Ne divisons pas la robe de l’Épouse, dit saint Bernard [17]. L’unité, tant au ciel qu’ici-bas, consiste en la charité [18]. Que celui qui se glorifie de la Règle n’agisse pas à rencontre, en allant contre l’Évangile [19]. Si le royaume de Dieu estait dedans de nous [20]), c’est qu’il n’est point dans le manger ou le boire, mais dans la justice, la paix, la joie du Saint-Esprit [21]. Critiquer autrui sur l’observance extérieure et négliger de la Règle le côté qui regarde l’âme, c’est écarter le moucheron de la coupe et avaler un chameau [22]. Tu brises ton corps par des travaux sans fin, tu mortifies par les austérités tes membres qui sont sur la terre ; et tu fais bien. Mais lorsque tu te permets de juger celui qui ne peine pas autant, lui peut-être se conforme à l’avis de l’Apôtre : empressé davantage pour les dons les meilleurs [23], retenant moins de cet exercice corporel qui est de moindre utilité, il s’adonne plus à la piété qui est utile à tout [24]. Qui donc de vous deux garde le mieux la Règle ? Celui sans doute qui s’en trouve meilleur. Or, le meilleur, quel est-il ? le plus humble ? ou le plus fatigué ? Apprenez de moi, dit Jésus [25], que je suis doux et humble de cœur » [26].
Parlant de la diversité des familles religieuses, saint François de Sales dit excellemment à son tour : « Toutes les Religions ont un esprit qui leur est général, et chacune en a un qui lui est particulier. Le général est la prétention qu’elles ont toutes d’aspirer à la perfection delà charité ; mais l’esprit particulier, c’est le moyen de parvenir à cette perfection de la charité, c’est-à-dire, à l’union de notre âme avec Dieu, et avec le prochain pour l’amour de Dieu » [27]. Venant donc à l’esprit spécial de l’institut qu’il avait fondé de concert avec notre Sainte, l’évêque de Genève déclare que c’est « un esprit d’une profonde humilité envers Dieu, et d’une grande douceur envers le prochain ; d’autant qu’ayant moins de rigueur pour le corps, il faut qu’il y ait tant plus de douceur de cœur » [28]. Et parce que « cette Congrégation a été érigée en sorte que nulle grande âpreté ne puisse divertir les faibles et infirmes de s’y ranger, pour y vaquer à la perfection du divin amour » [29] ; il ajoute gracieusement : « Que s’il y avait une sœur qui fût si généreuse et courageuse que de vouloir parvenir à la perfection dans un quart d’heure, faisant plus que la Communauté, je lui conseillerais qu’elle s’humiliât et se soumît à ne vouloir être parfaite que dans trois jours, allant le train des autres [30]. Car il faut observer toujours une grande simplicité en toutes choses : marcher simplement, c’est la vraie voie des filles de la Visitation, qui est grandement agréable à Dieu et très assurée » [31].
Avec la douceur et l’humilité pour devise, le pieux évêque était bien inspiré de donner à ses filles, comme armoiries, le divin Cœur où ces suaves vertus ont leur source aimée. On sait combien magnifiquement le ciel justifia ce blason. Le siècle n’était pas encore écoulé, qu’une religieuse de la Visitation, la Bienheureuse Marguerite-Marie, pouvait dire : « Notre adorable Sauveur m’a fait voir la dévotion de son divin Cœur comme un bel arbre qu’il avait destiné de toute éternité pour prendre ses racines au milieu de notre institut. Il veut que les filles de la Visitation distribuent les fruits de cet arbre sacré avec abondance à tous ceux qui désireront d’en manger, sans crainte qu’il leur manque » [32].
« Amour ! amour ! amour ! mes filles, je ne sais plus autre chose ». Ainsi s’écriait, elle aussi, en ses derniers ans, la glorieuse coopératrice de François dans l’établissement de la Visitation Sainte-Marie, Jeanne de Chantal. « Ma Mère, lui dit une sœur, je vais écrire à nos maisons que Votre Charité est en sa vieillesse, et que comme votre parrain saint Jean, vous ne nous parlez plus que d’amour ». A quoi la Sainte repartit : « Ma fille, ne faites point cette comparaison, car il ne faut pas profaner les Saints en les comparant aux chétifs pécheurs ; mais vous me ferez plaisir de mander à ces filles-là que si je croyais mon courage, si je suivais mon inclination, et si je ne craignais d’ennuyer nos sœurs, je ne parlerais jamais d’autre chose que de la charité ; et je vous assure que je n’ouvre presque jamais la bouche pour parler de choses bonnes, que je n’aie envie de dire : Tu aimeras le Seigneur de tout ton cœur, et ton prochain comme toi-même » [33].
Paroles bien dignes de celle qui valut à l’Église l’admirable Traité de l’Amour de Dieu, composé, dit l’évêque de Genève, à son occasion, prière et sollicitation, pour elle et ses semblables [34]. Tout d’abord cependant, l’impétuosité de cette âme, exubérante de dévouement et d’énergie, parut peu faite pour être maîtresse en une école où l’héroïsme se traduit dans la suavité simple d’une vie toute cachée en Dieu. C’est à discipliner cette énergie de la femme forte, sans en éteindre l’ardeur, que s’appliqua persévéramment saint François de Sales durant les dix-huit années qu’il en eut la conduite. « Faites tout, lui répète-t-il en mille manières, sans empressement, suavement comme font les Anges ; suivez la conduite des mouvements divins, rendez-vous souple à la grâce ; Dieu veut que nous soyons comme des petits enfants » [35]. Et ici trouve place une page délicieuse de l’aimable Saint, que nous voulons citer encore :
« Si l’on eût demandé au doux enfant Jésus, étant porté entre les bras de sa mère, où il allait ? N’eût-il pas eu raison de répondre : Je ne vais pas, c’est ma mère qui va pour moi. Et qui lui eût demandé : Mais au moins n’allez-vous pas avec votre mère ? N’eût-il pas eu raison de dire : Non, je ne vais nullement, ains seulement par les pas de ma mère, par elle et en elle. Et qui lui eût répliqué : Mais au moins, ô très cher divin enfant vous vous voulez bien laisser portera votre douce mère ? Non fais certes, eût-il pu dire, je ne veux rien de tout cela ; ains, comme ma toute bonne mère marche pour moi, aussi elle veut pour moi ; et, comme je ne marche que par ses pas, aussi je ne veux que par son vouloir ; et, dès que je me trouve entre ses bras, je n’ai aucune attention ni à vouloir, ni à ne vouloir pas, laissant tout autre soin à ma mère, hormis celui d’être sur son sein, et de me tenir bien attaché à son cou très aimable pour la baiser amoureusement des baisers de ma bouche ; et, afin que vous le sachiez, tandis que je suis parmi les délices de ces saintes caresses qui surpassent toute suavité, il m’est avis que ma mère est un arbre de vie, et que je suis en elle comme son fruit, que je suis son propre cœur au milieu de sa poitrine, ou son âme au milieu de son cœur : c’est pourquoi, comme son marcher suffit pour elle et pour moi, sans que je me mêle de faire aucun pas : aussi ne prends-je point garde si elle va vite ou tout bellement, ni si elle va d’un côté ou d’un autre, ni je ne m’enquiers nullement où elle veut aller, me contentant que, comme que ce soit, je suis toujours entre ses bras, joignant ses amiables mamelles, où je me repais comme entre les lis... Théotime [36], nous devons être comme cela, pliables et maniables au bon plaisir divin » [37].
L’office de Marthe parut d’abord vous être destiné, ô grande Sainte. Prévenant l’heure qui devait sonner pour Vincent de Paul un peu plus tard, François de Sales, votre Père, eut la pensée de faire de vos compagnes les premières filles de la Charité. Ainsi fut donné à votre œuvre le nom béni de Visitation, destiné à placer sous l’égide de Marie vos visites aux pauvres malades trop délaissés. Mais l’affaiblissement progressif des santés modernes avait manifesté, dans les institutions de la sainte Église, une lacune plus douloureuse encore, plus pressante à combler : nombre d’âmes, appelées à la part de Marie, en étaient écartées par leur impuissance à porter l’austère vie des grands Ordres contemplatifs. L’Époux, dont la bonté daigne s’adapter à tous les âges, fit choix de vous, ô Jeanne, pour subvenir avec son Cœur sacré, sur ce terrain de son amour, aux misères physiques aussi bien que morales du monde vieilli, usé, menaçant ruine.
Renouvelez-nous donc en l’amour de Celui dont la charité vous consuma la première ; dans ses ardeurs, vous parcourûtes les sentiers les plus divers de la vie, et jamais ne vous trahit l’admirable force d’âme que l’Église rappelle à Dieu aujourd’hui, pour obtenir par vous le secours nécessaire à notre faiblesse [38]. Que le funeste poison de l’esprit janséniste ne revienne plus jamais chez nous glacer les cœurs ; mais, en même temps, nous le savons de vous : l’amour n’est réel qu’autant qu’avec ou sans les macérations, il vit de foi, de générosité, de renoncement, dans l’humilité, la simplicité, la douceur. C’est l’esprit de votre saint institut, l’esprit de votre angélique Père rendu par lui si aimable et si fort : puisse-t-il régner toujours parmi vos filles, maintenir entre leurs maisons l’union suave qui n’a point cessé de réjouir les cieux ; puisse le monde s’assainir aux parfums qui s’échappent toujours des retraites silencieuses de la Visitation Sainte-Marie !
[3] Psalm. XLIV, 14.
[4] Ibid. 10-15.
[5] Apoc. XIX, 8.
[6] Psalm. XLIV, 15.
[7] Matth. XIX, 27.
[8] Cant. I, 3.
[9] Psalm. XLIV, 10.
[10] Ibid. 15-16.
[11] Ibid. 13.
[12] Ibid. 10.
[13] Cant. VI, 7.
[14] Psalm. XLIV, 11.
[15] Ibid. 10.
[16] Ibid. 10, 14, 15.
[17] Bernard. Apologia ad Guillelm. III, 6.
[18] Ibid. IV, 8.
[19] Ibid. V, 11.
[20] Luc. XVII, 21.
[21] Rom. XIV, 17.
[22] Bern. Apolog. VI, 12.
[23] I Cor. XII, 31.
[24] I Tim. IV, 8.
[25] Matth. XI, 29.
[26] Bern. Apolog. VII, 13.
[27] Entretiens spirituels, XIII.
[28] Ibid.
[29] Constitutions de la Visitation, Préambule.
[30] Entretien XIII.
[31] Entretien XIV.
[32] Lettre du 17 juin 1689, à la Mère de Saumaise.
[33] Mémoires de la Mère de Chaugy, IIIe P., ch. V.
[34] Traité de l’Amour de Dieu, Préface ; Mémoires de la M. de Chaugy, IIIe P. ch. XXIV, XXVI ; etc.
[35] Œuvres, passim.
[36] « Un grand serviteur de Dieu m’avertit naguère que l’adresse que j’avais faite de ma parole à Philothée en l’Introduction à la vie dévote avait empêché plusieurs hommes d’en faire leur profit, d’autant qu’ils n’estimaient pas dignes de la lecture d’un homme les avertissements faits pour une femme. J’admirai qu’il se trouvât des hommes qui, pour vouloir paraître hommes, se montrassent en effet si peu hommes... Toutefois, pour imiter en cette occasion le grand Apôtre, qui s’estimait redevable à tous, j’ai changé d’adresse en ce traité, et parle à Théotime. Que si d’aventure il se trouvait des femmes (or cette impertinence serait plus supportable en elles) qui ne voulussent pas lire les enseignements qu’on fait à un homme, je les prie de croire que le Théotime auquel je parle est l’esprit humain qui désire faire progrès en la dilection sainte, esprit qui est également ès femmes comme ès hommes ». Amour de Dieu, Préface.
[37] Amour de Dieu, Liv. IX, ch. XIV.
[38] Collecte, Secrète et Postcommunion de la fête.
François de Sales et Jeanne de
Chantal réunis sur une médaille du XIXe siècle
Bhx cardinal Schuster, Liber Sacramentorum
Disciple de saint François de Sales, elle a fait honneur à son maître et elle a démontré que, sans recourir nécessairement à ces formes spéciales et transcendantes de sainteté que nous trouvons chez les Pères du désert, on peut atteindre le sommet de la perfection chrétienne en aimant Dieu passionnément et en accomplissant ses devoirs d’état, dans la quadruple situation d’épouse, de mère, de veuve et de religieuse, tour à tour vécue par sainte Chantal.
Clément XIV introduisit dans le Bréviaire, sous le rite double, la fête de notre Sainte.
La messe est du Commun, mais les collectes sont propres :
Prière. — « Seigneur qui, dans votre toute-puissante miséricorde, vous êtes plu à enflammer d’une sainte ardeur votre bienheureuse et fidèle servante Jeanne-Françoise, et avez voulu qu’avec une admirable force d’âme, elle arrivât à la perfection en traversant les états de vie les plus variés, et même qu’elle devînt mère d’une nouvelle famille religieuse ; accordez-nous par ses mérites que, conscients de nos insuffisances, nous nous confiions dans votre grâce, avec l’aide de laquelle nous puissions triompher de tous les obstacles ». Le rédacteur a voulu dire trop de choses et il est arrivé ainsi à nous donner une collecte sans cursus et sans une idée vraiment centrale.
Sur les oblations. — « Que cette Hostie de salut nous enflamme de ces mêmes ardeurs dont brûla le cœur de la bienheureuse Jeanne-Françoise, l’embrasant de l’éternelle charité ». En cela réside une des raisons pour lesquelles Jésus a institué la sainte Eucharistie : Ignem veni mittere in terram, et quid volo nisi ut accendatur ? [39]
Remarquons que l’idée de feu, appliquée à l’Esprit Saint, revient plusieurs fois dans le Missel, et toujours dans l’oraison sur les oblations. Mais dans les anciennes formules liturgiques on invoquait sur l’autel le feu du Paraclet, pour qu’il consacrât et consumât le sacrifice, comme celui d’Élie. — Sacrificia, Domine, tuis oblata conspectibus, ignis ille divinus absumat [40], — lisons-nous dans la secrète du vendredi de la Pentecôte —, le rédacteur moderne de la collecte de ce jour modifie un peu cette idée, car, semblant oublier qu’il s’agit d’une oratio super oblata, il formule plutôt le texte d’une post-communion et nous fait demander le feu sacré de la charité qui est l’effet et le fruit de la sainte Communion.
Après la Communion. — « Répandez en nous, Seigneur, l’Esprit de votre amour, afin qu’après nous être rassasiés du Pain céleste, nous puissions, par les prières de la bienheureuse Jeanne-Françoise, mépriser les choses caduques et, avec toute l’ardeur de notre cœur, ne nous attacher qu’à vous seul ». A l’école du saint Évêque de Genève, la sainteté devient aimable et ne donne plus cette impression de mélancolie qu’une vertu débutante peut causer à ceux qui en sont témoins.
Madame de Chantal ayant confié la direction de son âme à saint François de Sales, ses domestiques disaient à ce propos : « Au temps des confesseurs précédents, Madame priait pendant plusieurs heures de la journée, et, pour ce, mettait dans l’embarras toute la domesticité. Monseigneur de Genève, au contraire, la fait prier maintenant continuellement et cela n’importune plus personne ».
[39] Luc. 12, 49 : Je suis venu jeter le feu sur la terre, et quel est Mon désir, sinon qu’il s’allume ?
[40] Que les sacrifices offerts en votre présence, Seigneur, soient consumés par ce feu divin.
Dom Pius Parsch, Le guide dans l’année liturgique
Fortiter et suaviter.
1. Sainte Jeanne de Chantal. — Jour de mort : 15 décembre 1641. Tombeau : dans le couvent des Visitandines d’Annecy. Vie : Jeanne-Françoise Frémiot de Chantal, fondatrice de l’Ordre de la Visitation, naquit en 1572 d’une illustre famille. Son père la donna en mariage au baron de Chantal ; épouse et mère, elle se dévoua entièrement à la formation morale et religieuse de ses enfants, de ses serviteurs et de ceux qui étaient sous sa dépendance. D’une très grande libéralité envers les pauvres, elle vit plus d’une fois la divine Providence multiplier ses modestes ressources ; aussi fit-elle vœu de ne jamais rien refuser à qui lui demanderait l’aumône au nom de Jésus-Christ. Son mari ayant été tué accidentellement à la chasse, elle supporta chrétiennement son deuil et voulut encore donner au meurtrier une marque publique de pardon en devenant la marraine de son fils. Une pieuse affection l’unissait à saint François de Sales, son directeur, et c’est avec son approbation qu’elle dit adieu à son père et à ses enfants, et fonda l’Ordre de la Visitation. — Messe « Cognovi » du commun des non Vierges.
2. Fortiter et suaviter. — La force et la douceur, l’énergie et la tendresse ; l’union de ces qualités est un des traits essentiels du caractère chrétien. De cette union le Sauveur lui-même donne le plus magnifique exemple : d’une énergie étonnante en certaines circonstances, et cependant toujours plein d’aménité et de bonté. Lorsqu’il s’arme d’un fouet pour chasser les vendeurs du temple, lorsqu’il déclare à saint Pierre, immédiatement après lui avoir promis les clefs du royaume des cieux : « Retire-toi de moi, Satan, tu m’es un scandale », il semble, oserions-nous dire, que nous ne comprenons plus le Sauveur ; mais il montre ailleurs une telle tendresse à l’égard des pécheurs, à l’égard de Marie-Madeleine, de la femme adultère, du bon larron, à l’égard de saint Pierre après son reniement ! Ainsi, devons-nous user de force et de douceur quand et comme il convient. Sachons être énergiques sans rigueur excessive, sans cesser d’être aimables ; et que notre bonté ne dégénère pas en faiblesse et en apathie. S’agit-il de nos principes, le dogme et la morale sont-ils en cause ? Alors soyons fermes et inébranlables ; point de tolérance admissible en pareille circonstance ; mais, dans nos rapports avec les hommes, ayons assez de douceur et de condescendance pour les comprendre, les excuser, ou leur pardonner. Un chrétien doit être ferme et rigide comme un père, compatissant et tendre comme une mère ! Telles sont les qualités que nous admirons aujourd’hui en sainte Jeanne de Chantal.
3. Un trait de la vie de sainte Jeanne de Chantal. — Un des moments les plus pénibles de sa vie fut celui où elle se sépara des siens : « Le 19 mars 1610, jour fixé pour les adieux, les parents et les amis de la sainte se réunirent chez M. Frémiot. L’assemblée était nombreuse. Tout le monde fondait en larmes. Mme de Chantal, seule, conservait un calme apparent ; mais ses yeux nageaient dans l’eau, et témoignaient de la violence qu’elle était obligée d’employer pour se contenir. Elle allait de l’un à l’autre, embrassant ses parents, leur demandant pardon, les conjurant de prier pour elle, essayant de ne pas pleurer, et pleurant plus fort. Quand elle arriva à ses enfants, elle n’y put tenir. Son fils, Celse-Bénigne, se pendit à son cou et essaya par mille caresses de la détourner de son projet. Mme de Chantal, penchée sur lui, le couvrait de baisers et répondait à toutes ses raisons avec une force admirable. Nul cœur, si insensible qu’il fût, n’était capable de retenir ses sanglots en entendant « ce discours filial et maternel si douloureusement amoureux ». Après que les cœurs eurent été épuisés de tendresse, Mme de Chantal, pour mettre fin à une scène qui l’accablait, se dégagea vivement des bras de son fils et voulut passer outre. Ce fut alors que Celse-Bénigne, désespéré de ne pouvoir retenir sa mère, se coucha en travers de la porte en disant : « Eh bien ! Ma mère, si je ne puis vous retenir, du moins vous passerez sur le corps de votre fils ». A ces mots, Mme de Chantal sentit son cœur se briser, et, ne pouvant plus soutenir le poids de sa douleur, elle s’arrêta et laissa couler librement ses larmes. Le bon M. Robert, qui assistait à cette scène déchirante, craignant que Mme de Chantal ne faiblît au moment suprême : « Eh quoi ! Madame, lui dit-il, les pleurs d’un enfant vous pourront ébranler ? – Non ! reprit la sainte en souriant à travers ses larmes ; mais que voulez-vous, je suis mère ! — Et, les yeux au ciel, nouvel Abraham elle passa sur le corps de son fils » [41].
[41] Mgr BOUGAUD. — Histoire de Sainte Chantal. Tome premier, p. 411-413.
Église Saint-Clément de Flottemanville - Statue de
sainte Jeanne de Chantal
Saint Jeanne de Chantal
Also known as
Jane Frances of Chantel
Jane Frances Fremiot de Chantal
Memorial
12 August
18 August (United
States)
13
December (monastery of
the Visitation in Moulins, France)
12 December (from 1970 to 2001)
21 August (the
date of the founding of her Order; from 1769 to 1969)
Profile
Born to the nobility, the daughter of the president of
the Parliament of Burgundy who
raised her alone after the death of
her mother when
Jeanne was 18 months old. Married in 1592 at
age twenty to Baron de Chantal. Mother of
four. Widowed at
28 when the Baron was killed in a hunting accident and died in
her arms. Taking a personal vow of chastity, she was forced to live with her
father-in-law, which was a period of misery for her. She spent her free time
in prayer,
and received a vision of the man who would become her spiritual director.
In Lent, 1604,
she met Saint Francis
de Sales, and recognized him as the man in her vision. She became a
spiritual student and close friend of Saint Francis,
and the two carried on a lengthy correspondence for years. On Trinity
Sunday, 6 June 1610 she
founded the Order
of the Visitation of Our Lady at Annecy, France.
The Order was
designed for widows and lay
women who did not wish the full life of the orders, and Jeanne oversaw
the founding of 69 convents.
Jeanne spent the rest of her days overseeing the Order,
and acting as spiritual advisor to any who desired her wisdom. Visitationist nuns today
live a contemplative life, work for women with poor
health and widows,
and sometimes run schools.
Born
28
January 1572 at Dijon, Burgundy, France
Died
13
December 1641 at
the Visitationist convent at
Moulins, France of
natural causes
relics at
Annecy, Savoy (in modern France
Beatified
21
November 1751 by Pope Benedict
XIV
Canonized
16 July 1767 by Pope Clement
XIII
Patronage
abandoned
or forgotten people; against abandonment
against
in-law problems
against
the death of parents
parents
separated from children
widows
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Readings
When shall it be that we shall taste the sweetness of
the Divine Will in all that happens to us, considering in everything only His
good pleasure, by whom it is certain that adversity is sent with as much love
as prosperity, and as much for our good? When shall we cast ourselves
undeservedly into the arms of our most loving Father in Heaven, leaving to Him
the care of ourselves and of our affairs, and reserving only the desire of
pleasing Him, and of serving Him well in all that we can? – Saint Jeanne
Hold your eyes on God and
leave the doing to him. That is all the doing you have to worry about. – Saint Jeanne
She was full of faith, and yet all her life long she
had been tormented by thoughts against it. Nor did she once relax in the
fidelity God asked of her. And so I regard her as one of the holiest souls I
have ever met on this earth. – Saint Vincent
de Paul
We should go to prayer with deep humility and an
awareness of our nothingness. We must invoke the help of the Holy Spirit and
that of our good angel, and then remain still in God’s presence, full of faith
that he is more in us than we are in ourselves. – Saint Jeanne
One day Saint Jane spoke the following eloquent words,
which listeners took down exactly as spoken: “My dear daughters, many of our
holy fathers in the faith, men who were pillars of the Church, did not
die martyrs.
Why do you think this was? Each one present offered an answer; then their
mother continued. “Well, I myself think it was because there is another
martyrdom: the martyrdom of love. Here God keeps his servants and handmaids in
this present life to that they may labor for him, and he makes of them both
martyrs and confessors.
I know,” she added, “that the Daughters
of the Visitation are meant to be martyrs of this kind and that, by
the favor of God, some of them, more fortunate than others in that their desire
has been granted, will actually suffer such a martyrdom.”
One sister asked what form this martyrdom took. The saint answered: “Yield
yourself fully to God, and you will find out! Divine love takes its sword to
the hidden recesses of our inmost soul and divides us from ourselves. I know
one person whom love cut off from all that was dearest to her, just as
completely and effectively as if a tyrant’s blade had severed spirit from
body.” We realized that she was speaking of herself. When another sister asked
how long the martyrdom would continue, the saint replied: “From the moment when
we commit ourselves unreservedly to God, until our last breath. I am speaking,
of course, of great-souled individuals who keep nothing back for themselves,
but instead are faithful in love. Our Lord does not intend this martyrdom for
those who are weak in love and perseverance. Such people he lets continue on
their mediocre way, so that they will not be lost to him; he never does
violence to our free will.” Finally, the saint was asked whether this martyrdom
of love could be put on the same level as martyrdom of the body. She answered:
“We should not worry about equality. I do think, however, that they martyrdom
of love cannot be relegated to a second place, for ‘love is as strong as
death.’ For the martyrs of love suffer infinitely more in remaining in this
life so as to serve god, than if they died a thousand times over in testimony
to their faith and love and fidelity.” – from the memoirs of the secretary of Saint Jane
Frances de Chantal
Fidelity toward God consists
in being perfectly resigned to his holy will, in enduring everything that his
goodness allows in our lives, and in carrying out all our duties, especially
that of prayer,
with love and for love. In prayer we
must converse very familiarly with our Lord, concerning our little needs,
telling him what they are, and remaining submissive to anything he may wish to
do with us… We should go to prayer with deep humility and an awareness of our
nothingness. We must invoke the help of the Holy
Spirit and that of our good angel, and then remain still in God‘s
presence, full of faith that he is more in us than we are in ourselves. There
is no danger if our prayer is without words or reflection because the good
success of prayer depends
neither on words nor on study. It depends upon the simple raising of our minds
to God,
and the more simple and stripped of feeling it is, the surer it is. We must
never dwell on our sins during prayer. Regarding our offenses, a simple
humbling of our soul before God, without a thought of this offense or that, is
enough…such thoughts act as distractions. – Saint Jeanne
de Chantal, from Wings to the Lord
MLA Citation
“Saint Jeanne de Chantal“. CatholicSaints.Info.
18 April 2021. Web. 12 August 2021.
<https://catholicsaints.info/saint-jeanne-de-chantal/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/saint-jeanne-de-chantal/
St. Jane Frances de Chantal
Born at Dijon, France, 28 January, 1572; died at the Visitation Convent Moulins, 13 December, 1641.
Her
father was president of the Parliament of Burgundy, and leader of the royalist party
during the League that brought about the
triumph of the cause of Henry IV. In 1592 she married Baron de Chantal, and lived in thefeudal castle of Bourbilly. She
restored order in the household, which was on the brink of ruin, and brought
back prosperity. During her husband's absence at the court, or with the army,
when reproached for her extremely sober manner of dressing, her reply was:
"The eyes which I must please are a hundred miles from here". She
found more than once that God blessed with miracles the care she gave the suffering members of Christ. St. Francis de Sales's eulogy of her characterizes her life at Bourbilly and everywhere else:
"In Madame de Chantal I have found the perfect woman, whom Solomon had difficulty in finding in Jerusalem".
Baron
de Chantal was accidentally killed by a harquebus while out shooting in 1601.
Left a widow at twenty-eight, with
four children, the broken-hearted baroness took a vow of chastity. In all her prayers she besoughtGod to send her a guide and God, in a vision, showed her
the spiritual director He held in reserve for her. In order to safeguard her children's property, she was obliged to go and live at Monthelon in the home of her father-in-law, who was
ruled over by an arrogant and wicked servant. This was real servitude,
which she bore patiently and gently for seven years. At last her virtue triumphed over the ill will of
the old man and house keeper.
During Lent, 1604, she visited her father at Dijon, where St. Francis de Sales was preaching at the Sainte Chapelle. She recognized in him the
mysterious director who had been shown her, and placed herself under his guidance. Then
began an admirable correspondence between the two saints. Unfortunately, the greater number of letters are no longer in existence, as she destroyed them after the death of the holy bishop. When she had assured the future security of
children, and when she had provided the education of Celse-Bénigne, her fourteen year old son, whom she left to her father
and her brother, the Archbishop of Bourges, she started for Annecy, where God was calling her to found
the Congregation of the
Visitation. She took her two remaining daughters with her, the elder having recently married the Baron of Thorens, a brother of St. Francis de Sales. Celse-Bénigne, impetuous like those of her race,
barred his mother's way by lying across the threshold. Mme de Chantal stopped,
overcome: "Can the tears of a child shake her resolution?" said a holy and learned priest, the tutor of Celse-Bénigne. "Oh! no", replied the saint, "but after all I am a mother!" And she stepped over the child's body.
The Congregation of the Visitation was canonically established at Annecy on Trinity Sunday, 6 June, 1610. Its aim was to receive, with a view to
their spiritual advancement, young girls and even widows who had not the desire
or strength to subject themselves to the austere ascetical practices in force in
all the religious orders at that time. St. Francis de Sales was especially desirous of seeing the realization of his cherished
method of attaining perfection, which consisted in always keeping one's will united
to the Divine will, in taking so
to speak one's soul, heart, and longings into one's hands and giving them
into God's keeping, and in seeking
always to do what is pleasing to Him. "I do always the things that please
him" (John 8:29). The two holy founders saw their
undertaking prosper. At the time of the death of St. Francis de Sales in 1622, the order
already counted thirteen houses; there were eighty-six when St. Jane Frances
died; and 164 when she was canonized.
The
remainder of the saint's life was spent under the protection of the cloister in the practice of the
most admirable virtues. If a gentle kindness, vivified
and strengthened by a complete spirit of renunciation, predominates in St. Francis de Sales, it is firmness and great vigour which prevails in St.
Jane Frances; she did not like to see her daughters giving way to human
weakness. Her trials were continuous and borne bravely, and yet she was exceedingly sensitive. Celse-Bénigne was an
incorrigible duellist. She prayed so fervently that he was
given the grace to die a Christian death on the battle-field,
during the campaign against the Isle of Ré (1627). He left a daughter who
became the famous Marquise de Sévigné. To family troubles God added interior crosses
which, particularly during the last nine years of her life, kept her in agony
of soul from which she was not
freed until three months before her death.
The
life of the saint was written in the
seventeenth century, with inimitable charm, by her secretary, Mother de Chaugy. Monsignor Bougaud, who died Bishop of Laval, published in 1863 a
"Histoire de Sainte Chantal" which had a great and well-deserved
success.
The
words of the saint comprise instructions on
the religious life, various minor works, among which
is the admirable "Deposition for the Process of Beatification of St.
Francis de Sales", and a great many letters. Thesaint's qualities are seen in her precise and
vigorous style, void of imagery but betraying a repressed emotion, and bursting
forth spontaneously from the heart, anticipating in its method the beautiful French of the seventeenth century. The book
which may be called her masterpiece, "Réponses sur les Régles,
Constitutions et Coutumes", a truly practical and complete code of the religious life, is not in circulation.
Pernin, Raphael. "St. Jane
Frances de Chantal." The
Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol.
8. New
York: Robert Appleton Company,1910. 15 Mar. 2015 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08282c.htm>.
Transcription. This article was transcribed for
New Advent by Joseph P. Thomas. Dedicated to Mary Ann Gregoregyk.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. October 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of
New York.
Copyright © 2020
by Kevin Knight. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
SOURCE
:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08282c.htm
St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Widow
and Abbess
Her life is written by Dr. Henry de
Maupas du Tour, bishop of Puy, in 4to., also in 12mo. by Mrs. Louisa de
Rabutin, who was married first to Monsieur de Daletz, and after his death to
Monsieur de la Ravière. This work has been often by mistake ascribed to her
father, Roger de Rabutin, count of Bussy, famous for several juvenile loose
productions of false wit, and more deservedly for his edifying repentance, by
which he endeavoured to repair that scandal, and to live sincerely to God,
after he had forsaken the court. See also her life compiled by Marsollier,
canon of Usez; and the lives of the first mother-superiors, and several other
nuns of the Visitation, published in four volumes, in 4to. by sister De Chaugy,
at Annecy, 1659.
A.D. 1641
THE FATHER of St. Jane de Chantal
was Benignus Fremiot, one of the presidents of the parliament of Burgundy,
famous for his loyalty to Henry IV., in opposing the league; also for his great
piety, and the modesty with which he refused the dignity of first president, by
which he showed himself the more worthy of that honour. By his lady, Margaret
de Berbisy, he had three children, Margaret, who was afterwards married to the
count of Effran; Jane, who was born at Dijon, on the 23d of January, 1573; and
Andrew, who died archbishop of Bourges. The president Fremiot was left a
widower by the death of his lady, whilst his children were yet in their
infancy; but he took such pious and prudent care of their education that no
assistance or instructions were wanting for forming them in the most perfect
sentiments and practice of every religious duty, and for introducing them into
life with advantage. Jane, who at her confirmation was called Frances, profited
by them above the rest, and was most tenderly beloved by her father, who gave
her in marriage when she was twenty years of age to the Baron de Chantel, chief
of the family of Rabutin, then twenty-seven years old, an officer of
distinction in the French army, and highly in favour with King Henry IV. The
marriage was solemnized at Dijon, and a few days after she went with her
husband to his seat at Bourbilly. She found a family, which, by the absence of
the master, had not been much accustomed to regularity, which she made it her
first care to establish. She was very attentive to see that all her domestics
were every day present at evening prayers; and at mass on Sundays and great
holidays in the parish church, on all other days at home. Regular hours were
assigned for meals, and every employment and duty was discharged with great order,
she being sensible that this is an indispensable part of virtue, to which few
things are more fatal than the confusion of a disorderly life or family. During
the frequent absence of her husband, who was obliged often to attend the court
or the army, she scarcely ever admitted any company, and never stirred abroad,
knowing how much this virtue is both the duty and the delight of a good wife,
in order to watch over her servants, children, and domestic concerns, and to
shun the snares of dissipation, levity, vanity, love of trifling, and much loss
of time, which insensibly sap the very foundations of a virtuous life, and
strike at the roots of a Christian spirit. Neither did she indulge herself any
time in sloth, or ever find any part of her time a burden, as those ladies so
often do, who, living in a perpetual round of empty amusements, are sometimes
cloyed with insipid pleasures, sometimes wearied with continual noise and
hurry, or ruffled by mortifications and affronts, always sick in solitude,
restless and impatient in their pursuits, longing for, and condemning every
thing in its turn; one hour dissolved in ease or vain joy, another devoured by
melancholy; the continual jest of their own foolish pride and caprice, and a
prey by fits to every spiritual passion. True virtue is constant, uniform, and
always calm, tasting in itself solid joys. A fervent soul which looks upon
every moment of time as infinitely precious, embraces and improves it with an
eagerness which never flattens, and inspires vigour even under the severest
trials of spiritual dryness. This pious lady employed all her leisure hours
either at her work or in the daily long exercises of prayer and pious reading
which she prescribed to herself. These devotions she at first much abridged when
her husband was at home, at which seasons her house was usually full of company. 1 But, afterwards repenting of this
loss of time, and always finding the spirit of piety much impaired in her by
that dissipation and amusement or play, beyond what necessity might excuse, she
resolved, in 1601, no more, upon any such pretence, to curtail her usual
exercises; and from that time she so contrived matters as neither to omit any
of her devotions, nor to be wanting to any office which charity, courtesy, or
other duties of her station in the world required of her. The Baron de Chantal
was a nobleman of strict honour, and very religious. Nor was any thing which
the world could afford wanting to this pious couple to complete the happiness
of the married state. But God, who would reign alone in the heart of our saint,
prepared it for himself by the most sensible sacrifice.
The baron, in complaisance to a
friend who was come to see him, went out one day a shooting; and, as he had on
a coat which resembled the colour of a deer, his friend, mistaking him for one
behind the bushes, shot him in the thigh. He survived this accident nine days,
during which time he received the holy sacraments in the most edifying
sentiments of resignation and piety, and caused his pardon of the person by
whom he had been shot to be recorded in the registers of the parish church,
strictly forbidding any one to prosecute or bring him into trouble. He expired
in the arms of his disconsolate lady, who was left a widow at twenty-eight
years of age, with one little son and three daughters; besides which she had
buried two children in their infancy. Her grief was not to be expressed; yet
she bore it with such a heroic constancy and resignation, that she sometimes
said she was surprised to see herself receive so grievous a shock with so great
contentedness and equanimity. In her desolate state, offering herself to suffer
whatever crosses God should be pleased to lay upon her, she made an entire
sacrifice of herself to him with the most perfect resignation, and a vow of
perpetual chastity. In the depth of this affliction she found an extraordinary
comfort and joy at the thought that she was now at liberty to give herself more
perfectly to the divine service; and she repeated to God, Thou hast
broken my bonds, and I will sacrifice to thee a victim of praise. 2 The more authentically to testify
her perfect forgiveness of him who had been the cause of her husband’s death,
she studied constantly to do him every good office in her power, and stood
godmother to one of his children. According to the rules laid down by St. Paul,
St. Ambrose, and other holy fathers, to sanctify the state of her widowhood,
she proposed to herself a new plan of life. A considerable part of the nights
she spent in tears and prayers. She redoubled her alms, distributed all her
rich clothes among the poor, making a vow not to wear any but what were made of
linen; she discharged most of her servants, giving all of them honourable
recompenses; fasted much, lived retired, and divided all her time between the
instruction and care of her children, her prayers, and her work. Such was her
fervour, and so ardent her desire of living perfectly to God alone, that she
wished she could hide herself in some desert, to be more removed from all
worldly hindrances. She declared in confidence, that had not her four little
children been a tie upon her, too fast for her conscience to get clear of, she
believed she should have fled to the Holy Land, and there ended the remainder
of her days; and it was her earnest and continual prayer, with many tears, that
God would free her from whatever could hinder her from loving and serving him,
and that he would conduct her to a truly holy spiritual guide, by whom she
might be instructed in what manner she might in all things best accomplish his
adorable will. She then received in her devotions many heavenly favours. One
day, while she was earnestly begging our Lord to bring her to a faithful guide
who should conduct her to himself, she saw on a sudden a man of the same
stature and features with St. Francis of Sales, in a black cassock with a
rochet and cap on, just as he was the first time she saw him afterwards at
Dijon. Another time, being in a little wood, her soul was in a rapture, and she
desired to get into a church that was near, but all in vain. Here it was given
her to understand that divine love must consume all the rust of self-love in
her, and that she should meet with a great many troubles both from within and
without. Upon recovering herself, she found her heart in wonderful joy in the
Lord, insomuch that to suffer for God seemed to her the food of love on earth,
as his enjoyment is in heaven.
When the year of her mourning was
expired, her virtuous and tender father Fremiot sent for her to his house at
Dijon, where she pursued much the same manner of life, except that she
sometimes received visits from certain grave ladies who were of an advanced
age. A year after this she was obliged, by the affairs of her family, to go
with her children to Montelon, one league from Autun, to live with her
father-in-law, the old Baron de Chantal, who was then seventy-five years of
age. Her patience was there put to a continual severe trial by the perpetual
frowardness of the old gentleman, and the imperious carriage of a peevish
housekeeper, whose authority was absolute in the family. Jane never let fall
the least word of complaint, nor discovered the least sourness in her looks;
and her compliance in every thing was cheerful and agreeable. But she gave most
of her time to prayer, and on Sundays went to Autun which was three little
leagues off, to assist at sermons. It happened in the year 1604 that St.
Frances of Sales came to preach the Lent at Dijon, upon which occasion the
devout widow made a visit to her father Fremiot, that she might have the
opportunity of assisting at the sermons of that celebrated preacher, and eminent
servant of God. The first time she saw him she was much taken with his saintly
deportment, and was persuaded he was the spiritual director she had long begged
of God to send her, to conduct her soul in the most perfect paths of his holy
love. Before she spoke, the bishop knew her from a former vision, in which God
had manifested to him this future vessel of his grace. St. Francis dined
frequently at her father the president Fremiot’s house, and by hearing his
familiar discourse, she conceived a great confidence in him, and felt
extraordinary sentiments of devotion kindled in her breast. It was her earnest
desire that she might be allowed to lay open to him the interior state and
dispositions of her soul; but she was hindered by a scruple on account of a vow
she had made, by the advice of an indiscreet religious man, her director, not
to address herself to any other than to himself for spiritual advice. She,
however took great delight in hearing St. Francis’s discourses. One day the
good bishop seeing her dressed better than usual, said to her: “Madam, would
not your head-dress have been neat without this lace? and your handkerchief
been good enough without fringe?” The devout widow hereupon cut the fringe off
upon the spot, and the lace at night. The bishop, who knew that nothing is
little that is done with a desire perfectly to please God, was much delighted
with her ready obedience.
The perplexities about her
indiscreet vow, the resolution of which St. Francis referred to others, being
at length removed, she made several confessions to him, and a general one of
her whole life. At the same time she suffered severe interior trials by
desolation of soul, and alarming anxieties about her conduct, under which she
received great light and comfort by the wholesome councils of St. Francis. By
his advice, she so regulated her devotions and other exercises of virtue, as to
conform herself in her exterior to the will of others, and to what she owed to
the world whilst she lived in the houses of her father and father-in-law. This
conduct charmed every one, and made them say: “Madam prays always, yet is never
troublesome to any body.” She rose at five o’clock, always without a fire, and
without the attendance of a maid. She made an hour’s meditation; then called up
her children, and went with her family to mass. After dinner, she read the holy
scripture for half an hour; at evening catechised her children and some others
of the village: read again, and said her beads before supper; retired at nine
o’clock, said evening prayers with her children and family; after which, she
continued a long time in prayer alone. In the employments of the day, and even
in company, nothing seemed to interrupt the attention of her soul to God. She
mortified her taste in whatever she ate, yet without showing it; she wore a
hair-cloth, coarse linen, and very plain clothes; visited the poor who were
sick in the neighbourhood, watched whole nights by the bedside of those who
were dying, and among other distressed helpless persons, maintained one that
was covered with ulcers, which she used to dress with her own hands. The
constant sweetness and mildness of her temper showed how perfectly she had
already mortified her interior, and subdued her passions. This proved her
devotion to be solid, and rendered it amiable to men, as it was perfect before
God. St. Francis, whom she visited from time to time at Annecy after his return
thither, often admired the entire disengagement of her heart from all earthly
things, and the fervour and purity of affection with which she sought in all
things the will of God. Every morning she renewed her firm purpose of loving
and seeking the holy will of God alone in all her thoughts and actions,
desiring always to die to herself and to all creatures, that she might live
only to God, and making an oblation of herself to him without reserve. For a
token of this total dedication of herself to him, she wrote on her breast near
the seat of her heart the holy name of Jesus.
The more her soul strove by
self-denial and assiduous prayer to raise itself above the world, and its low
concerns, its wings expanded and unfolded themselves, and she discovered new
charms, and a greater light in the heavenly truths of religion, which then
seemed to have been folded and shut up before. The better to apply herself to
these great means of improving her heart in the divine love, she began to
entertain thoughts of renouncing the world. When she had disclosed this
inclination to St. Francis, he took some time to recommend the matter to God,
and at length proposed to her divers religious Orders. Her answer only was,
that she desired to embrace whatever state he judged most conducive to the
divine honour. He then mentioned his project of forming a new establishment of
a congregation of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary. The pious widow embraced
the proposal with extreme joy; but the excessive grief of her aged father and
father-in-law, the tender age of her children, and the situation of the affairs
of her family, raised great obstacles to her design, and gave her much to
suffer. No one who lies under any obligations of justice to others, can,
without first discharging them, lawfully embrace any state incompatible with
them. Such circumstances point out what it is that God requires of a soul, and
in what state or means her perfection is to be sought. Some pretended the
obligation which Madame de Chantal owed to her children could not be complied
with, unless she remained with them in the world. St. Francis evinced, on the
contrary, that in a cloister she would be able to watch over their education
with no less vigilance, and perhaps, even with greater advantage to them, than
by continuing always with them; and this, which it was her indispensable duty
to provide for, she engaged herself still to do. After many violent struggles,
this consideration of prudence being settled, her aged father and father-in-law
gave their consent; but this they did with such floods of tears as would have
shook a constancy less heroic than hers. This conflict was a great sacrifice
especially in one of so dutiful and tender a soul; but the love of God, which
was her only view in this action, triumphed over the sentiments of nature; and
the same motive obliged her friends themselves at length to approve her
resolution, though it cost them so dear.
Before she left the world she
married her eldest daughter to St. Francis’s eldest nephew, the young Baron de
Thorens, which match was esteemed by all her friends very honourable and
advantageous. Her two younger daughters she determined to take with her; and
the one died in a short time in her arms; the other she afterwards married to
the Count de Toulonjon, a nobleman of great virtue, prudence, and honour. Her
son, the Baron de Chantal, was only fifteen years old, and him she left under
the care of her father, and of excellent tutors, and showed that his affairs
required no longer her presence, except to superintend his education, which she
engaged to do, and promised for that purpose still to visit him, which St.
Francis likewise engaged that she should do. Her reasons had perfectly
satisfied her father, father-in-law, and uncle the archbishop, who had long
opposed her resolution; nevertheless, though they agreed that her design was a
call of heaven, and neither against the rules of prudence nor any other duty,
yet the tenderness which nature inspired, raised a fresh storm when the time of
her parting came. Taking leave of her father-in-law, the old Baron de Chantal,
at Montelon, she fell on her knees, begged his pardon if she had ever
displeased him in anything, desired his blessing, and recommended her son to
him. The old gentleman, who was in his eighty-sixth year, appeared
inconsolable, and tenderly embracing her, wished her all happiness. The
inhabitants of Montelon, especially the poor, who thought that in her they lost
their all, expressed their grief by tears and loud lamentations. She made them
all a short exhortation, and recommended herself to their prayers. Thus she
took leave of them, and being accompanied by the Baron of Thorens, his lady,
her second daughter, and her son, and others, dined at Autun; but called on the
way to engage a good religious man to omit nothing in helping her father-in-law
to save his soul; and he kept his word. At Dijon she bade adieu to all her
neighbours; then casting herself at the feet of her aged father, she besought
him to bless her, and to take care of her son, whom she left with him. The
president, feeling his heart oppressed with unutterable grief, and bathed in
tears, said: “O my God! it is not for me to oppose your designs. It will cost
me my life. To you, O Lord, I offer this dear child; receive her, and be you my
comfort.” He then gave her his blessing, and lifted her up. Young Chantal, her
son, ran to her, clasped her about the neck, and by the most endearing
expressions, endeavoured to prevail with her to alter her resolution. When he
was not able to gain his point, he threw himself across the door. The holy
widow stepped over his body, but returned again, shedding some tears. With a
serene countenance she again took leave, checking the emotions of nature by
reflecting that her resolution having been judged, after the most mature
deliberation and advice, to be the call of heaven, it was her duty to follow
it, and a happiness and pleasure to make to God an entire sacrifice of all that
was most dear. Her journey to Annecy was prosperous; but she conducted the
Baron de Thorens and his lady to their seat, saw them settled, then returning
to Annecy, laid the foundation of her new institute at Annecy on Trinity
Sunday, 1610, the holy bishop having provided there a convent for that purpose.
Two other devout women took the habit with her, and were joined soon after by
ten others.
The Cardinal of Marquemont,
archbishop of Lyons, having persuaded St. Francis to change the plan of this
congregation so far as to make it a religious Order, that it might be rendered
of a more lasting continuance, the pious widow and her companions made their
solemn vows in his hands. The holy founder would have the two sister virtues of
humility and meekness to be the basis of this rule. “In the practice of
virtues,” said he to our saint and her religious sisters, “let humility be the
source of all the rest; let it be without bounds; make it the reigning
principle of all your actions. Let an unalterable meekness and sweetness in all
events become by habits natural to you.” He gave them excellent instructions on
the great duty of prayer, that heavenly exercise being the chief fruit and end
of religious retirement. Speaking of the adorable sacrifice of the altar, he
said to St. Jane, “The mass is the sun of spiritual exercises, the heart of
devotion, the centre of our divine religion. Unite your heart in it with the
church triumphant and militant, which joins itself here in one body with
Christ, its sacred head, through him to drawn down by a holy violence the mercy
of the Father upon us.” He inculcated to his spiritual children the necessity
of mortifying the senses; for the flesh having been partner in the sin of our
first parents, and continuing to be so in the revolt against the spirit, it is
to be chastised, subdued, and crucified; and the senses being the avenues of
the soul, are the instruments by which the passions are inflamed, and these
never can be governed, unless those inlets be strictly guarded and curbed.
Hence the obligation of exterior mortification is so strongly inculcated in the
law of the gospel; neither can any one hope to obtain the mastery of his
interior, and to possess or govern his soul without this extrinsic succour. Yet
St. Francis did not enjoin by this rule any great austerities, that it might be
accommodated to the weakest constitutions, and might be less liable to the
danger of pernicious relaxations creeping in under the cloak of frequent
dispensations. But then he pointed out a constant crucifixion of the senses by
little denials; for he had observed the dangerous mistake of some, who,
professing austere rules, are so far strangers to the spirit of their
institute, and of their holy founders, as to flatter themselves the
extraordinary rigours they practise are to be compensated by other indulgences.
Whilst under this pretence they allow themselves many liberties, they in a great
measure forfeit the advantages of their other mortifications, and the senses,
by being sometimes indulged with excess and delicacy, remain headstrong and
untamed. Some degrees of relaxation on certain occasions are reasonable and
necessary in all states; but a loose is never to be given to the
senses in eating and drinking, or in any other point. If the rule prescribed by
St. Francis was in this respect milder than many others, and seemed more easy
in practice, he, on the other side, allowed no mitigation in the essential
interior mortification of the will and the passions. Many have the courage to
renounce exterior things, as St. Gregory observes; but very few can find in
their hearts truly to die to themselves. For want of this, many who are
virtuous and devout in appearance, will be found to have heaped up nothing but
false virtues, and often in their very fasts and prayers to have offered
sacrifices which were abominable in the sight of God, because infected with the
stinking poison of self-love; nor is it enough to banish self-will in greater
vices so long as it is suffered still to fortify itself in smaller inordinate
attachments. The least of these is a tie which fastens the soul to the earth,
and an obstacle to the reign of the pure love of God in her. This lesson St.
Francis strongly inculcates to his spiritual daughters. “We must die,” said he, 3 “that God may live in us. It is
impossible to procure the union of our souls with God by any other means. These
words seem hard; but they are followed with others of incomparable sweetness,
that by this death we are united to God.” He taught them, that the principal
means by which we are thus to die to ourselves, are perfect obedience to superiors,
and entire resignation to the divine will, so as never to ask, never to refuse
anything in diet, or such temporal things; never to be disturbed or uneasy in
any concerns. “You ask,” said he again, 4 “what I desire should remain most
deeply engraven on your mind. Ah! what shall I say to you, my most dear
daughters, but these two words: Desire nothing, refuse nothing. For this
document compriseth the perfect doctrine of indifferency of the will. Behold,
the little Jesus in the crib refuseth nothing, cold, poverty, nakedness, the
company of beasts, all the injuries of the season, and whatever his Father
permitted. Neither did he refuse those little comforts which his mother offered
him. Even so we ought to receive equally all that Providence shall permit to
befal us,” &c.
By these excellent maxims did our
saint regulate her conduct, and she never ceased to inculcate the same, both by
word and example, to her religious sisters. She taught them by humility to love
and receive well reprimands and correction; for our souls are spiritually sick,
and must rejoice to be pared and cut, to receive their polish, suffering
cheerfully the fire and the lancet of humiliations and mortification. The
greatest mark of true humility and perfect virtue is, if a soul loves to be
humbled and corrected. St. Jane exhorted her nuns to complete in themselves, by
a devout spirit of prayer, the work which they began by humility, obedience,
and self-denial. She instructed them to repeat acts of divine love, a hundred
and a hundred times a-day, by ejaculatory aspirations, by them darting their
affections towards God, and continually offering to him their hearts and all
their actions. Being scrupulously exact in the least circumstances relating to
the divine service, she taught all under her care the same spirit of religion.
Once hearing a noise made in a chamber under the chapel whilst the blessed
sacrament was exposed, to repair that fault, of irreverence, or inadvertence,
she at dinner asked pardon of God for her sisters, kissed their feet, and dined
on the floor, which is an ordinary humiliation and penance in many religious
communities. When some of the sisters did not rise instantly at the toll of the
bell for the divine office, she gave a public reprimand with many tears,
saying: “If we reflect that it is the voice of God which calls us to pay him
our homage, we should not loiter one moment.” But a detail of her admirable
lessons, and the edifying instances of her charity, meekness, and all virtues,
would be too long for this place, but may be read in her life written by the
Bishop of Puy, and again by Marsollier. Soon after she had made her religious
profession, she desired to make a vow of doing in every action what she thought
most perfect or most pleasing to God; which she did with the approbation of St.
Francis, who said he knew the constant fervour and perfection of her soul in
labouring always to accomplish such a vow, which never can be allowed, except
to persons in whom the most perfect habits of fervour have taken the deepest
root. 5 This saint was afflicted with
frequent painful sicknesses, and suffered for some time many grievous interior
trials from a scrupulous fear of offending God. But it appears from the state
of her interior, as she laid it open to her holy director, that she frequently
received extraordinary consolations and favours from God. Her sickness seemed
to her physicians sometimes to proceed from the ardour of the divine love with
which she was consumed. In one of her letters to St. Francis, she said: “The
whole world would die of love for so amiable a God, if I could make it feel the
sweetness which a soul tastes in loving him.”
The affairs of her children, after
the death of her father, and the foundation of many new convents at Lyons,
Grenoble, Bourges, Dijon, Moulins, Nevers, Orleans, and Paris, obliged her
often to leave Annecy. The very same year that she took the habit, upon the
death of her pious father, she went to Dijon, and staid there some months to
settle her affairs, and place her son in the academy. She afterwards procured
his marriage with Miss Mary de Coulange, a beautiful, virtuous, and rich young
lady. At Paris she met with a violent persecution; but God strengthened and
comforted her under it; and by the example of her astonishing meekness and
patience, rendered her the admiration of those who had been her most bitter
adversaries. She governed her convent at Paris for three years, from 1619 to
1622. In the following year, the death of St. Francis was a grievous affliction
to her, which, nevertheless, her perfect resignation to the divine will made
her to bear with unshaken constancy. It was her happiness to bury his body with
great honour in the church of her convent at Annecy. Her son having prepared
himself for battle, by devoutly receiving the sacraments, was killed fighting
against the Huguenots, in the isle of Rhé, in 1627, and in the thirty-first
year of his age, leaving a new married lady, with a daughter not a year old,
who was the celebrated Madame de Sevigné. 6 St. Jane received this afflicting
news, which drew tears from strangers, with such an heroic fortitude and entire
submission to the divine appointments, as astonished those who were with her.
Upon any sudden affliction she used to offer her heart to God, saying:
“Destroy, cut, burn, whatever opposes your holy will.” Her daughter-in-law de
Chantel was snatched away in 1631, leaving her only daughter five years old.
The very next day after she had received this melancholy news, she heard that
of the death of her son-in-law, the Count Toulonjon, whom she most tenderly
loved, and who died at Pignerol, of which he was governor. Our saint neglected
nothing to comfort the young widow her daughter. Exterior trials, how severe
soever, were light in comparison of the interior anguish, darkness, and
spiritual dryness which she sometimes experienced for a considerable time, as
appears from several of her letters, quoted by the bishop of Puy. Good God! how
adorable are the designs of your providence! You suffer those souls which are
most dear to you seemingly to lose themselves in labyrinths, to wander in mists
and darkness, amidst various disturbances of mind. Yet these are certain and
direct paths to happiness; and with infinite wisdom do you make them lead to
yourself, the source and centre of all light. So sweetly, through your mercy,
do all things work together to the good of your elect. This saint was in return
often favoured with extraordinary consolations.
By all her trials, and by her
constant love and practice of the most heroic humility, patience, meekness,
charity, and obedience, she laboured assiduously to overcome herself, and to
gain and maintain an absolute ascendant of the superior part of her soul over
the inferior. She never ceased inculcating to her religious sisters the
necessity of continually renouncing and dying to ourselves, out of a great
desire of pleasing God; for by this is the servant of God styled the strong
woman, because she courageously and earnestly puts her hand to the most
difficult task of conquering and subduing herself. “Our Saviour,” said the
saint to her nuns, “has annexed the prize of his love and of eternal glory to
the victory we gain over ourselves. Your intention in coming to the visitation
is to disunite yourselves from yourselves, in order to be united to God. It is
a little field, where, unless one die to oneself, there will be no reaping of
fruits. You can only upon this condition be spouses of Jesus Christ, that by crucifying
your judgment, your will, and your inclinations, you may become like to him.
This spouse of your hearts makes you climb up, and draws you after him to the
top of Mount Calvary, where, crowned with thorns, he suffers himself to be
stripped, nailed, despised, and afflicted with a thousand and a thousand
unspeakable sharp torments. It is your part to continue there with him,
endeavouring to imitate him by an entire conformity in two points. The first
is, to get clear of yourselves, and with constancy aspire to perfection. We
come from the world rough, unpolished, and full of evil inclinations, which we
must labour to cut away. Unless we strike off these irregularities, we can
never square with him, who is perfect and holy. The second point is, to suffer
your hearts to be mortified, pared, and bent as is thought expedient, by
obedience, and an entire resignation of yourselves into the hands of those who
direct you, with perfect simplicity. Let them or the hand of God strike where
you feel it most. If you resist, you cannot become the spouses of Christ
crucified, nor attain to perfection. On the contrary, if in good earnest you
abandon and renounce yourselves, you will find an incomparable sweetness in
God’s service, and it will be your delight to trample on self-love for the
advancing of the kingdom of grace. It is the reward God promised to the
conqueror. “I will give them a hidden manna,” says he; which upon the first
tasting it, will give them a loathing of all the delights which the whole earth
affords. But take notice, that you must conquer before you can taste this
manna; for it is not afforded to the cowardly, but reserved for souls of
valour, courage, and resolution, that are absolutely determined to sacrifice
all, without reserving any thing for themselves; they who leave nothing alive,
but kill every evil inclination, will have a title to all. But this violence
ought to be sweet and gentle, though firm and constant. O my children, kill
boldly and courageously your enemy. By its death you will gain peace and life.
I know one who has made an unspeakable progress by this method of overcoming
himself in every respect; he is advanced in his way in a little time much
further than many others less resolved in the business of self-denial.” On
another occasion, our saint bitterly deplored the blindness and misery of many
souls who practise exercises of devotion; but being of an unmortified and
self-conceited temper, reap little benefit, but rather fall more easily into
pride, and imagine they are in a state to which they are utterly strangers.
Being once consulted by letter about a religious person who seemed to live in
great virtue, and to receive extraordinary graces, she wrote back: “You have
sent me the leaves of the tree; send me likewise some of its fruit, that I may
judge of it; for I matter not the leaves. Now the fruits of a good heart which
God waters and nourishes with his grace, are a total forgetfulness of itself, a
great love of humiliations, and an universal joy and satisfaction in every body’s
good.”
Thus did our excellent directress of
souls in the paths of virtue study first to draw them from themselves, and to
vanquish in them all inordinate attachments and evil inclinations, in order to
carry them towards God; to whom souls which are perfectly disentangled from
earthly things, are wonderfully united by divine love, and its main source and
vital action, a spirit of prayer. As to the manner of holy meditation or
prayer, she advised that persons be instructed how to excite pious affections,
and form good resolutions in that exercise; but would have them allowed to
follow these affections according to their own devotion, and the motions of the
Holy Ghost. She exhorted strenuously to perseverance, and if distractions
molest us, to make a prayer of patience, humbly and lovingly begging God to be
our support, and to inspire us with a desire of loving and praising him, and
the like. To pray always is a lesson she often repeated to her religious,
saying, that the heart ought to be praying and loving while we are at our
recreation, work, speaking, or resting; which is the meaning of the spouse,
when she says: “I sleep, but my heart watcheth.” In a time of spiritual
dryness, when she found her heart dull in its inward operations, she wrote a
prayer made up of various acts of love, praise, thanksgiving, compunction, and
supplications for herself, friends, enemies, sinners, the dead, and whatever
she desired to ask of God; and this paper she carried day and night at her
neck, having made this amorous compact with our Lord, that as often as she
pressed it on her heart, it should express her intention of repeating all these
acts with the utmost fervour of which she was capable. Of the same nature is a
desire by repeating Amen, to assent to, and join in all the acts of love and
praise, which the heavenly spirits and all God’s servants on earth offer
without intermission, and in the supplications of the latter. A pestilence
raged violently two years at Annecy. The duke and duchess of Savoy endeavoured
several ways to engage our saint to provide for her safety by flight. But she
could not be induced to abandon her dear flock; and by her exhortations, alms,
and prayers, exceedingly alleviated the public calamity in that city. Her whole
community was by a singular providence preserved from the contagion. In 1638
the duchess royal of Savoy called her to Turin, to found there the convent of
her Order. She was soon after invited to Paris by the queen of France, and to
her extreme mortification, was treated there with the greatest distinction and
honour imaginable. In her return she fell ill of a fever, with a peripneumony
or inflammation of the lungs, by which she was detained on the road in her
convent at Moulins. There it was that, having received the last sacraments, and
given her last instructions to her nuns, she, with wonderful tranquillity, died
the death of the saints on the 13th of December, 1641, being sixty-nine years
old. Her mortal remains were conveyed with great honour to Annecy. Among
several visions of her glory, St. Vincent of Paul, who had been her confessor
at Paris, was favoured with one, about which he consulted the bishop of Paris,
a judicious monk, and some other learned men. Though he carefully concealed the
divine gifts and favours, yet for the glory of this great servant of God, he
left an authentic verbal process of this vision, but as of a third person. In
it he says he had never been favoured with any vision relating to the glory of
any other saint, and that he had always the highest opinion of the sanctity of
this pious lady. He tells us, that upon the news of her sickness he was praying
for her with great earnestness, when he saw a little shining ball, as it were,
of fire rising from the earth, and meeting in the air another larger ball of
fire; both which mounted up to the heavens, and buried themselves in an immense
bright fire, which, as an interior voice told him in a very distinct manner,
represented the divine essence, and the other two balls the souls of blessed
Jane Frances Chantal, and St. Francis of Sales. Soon after he heard of her
death, and was struck with a sudden apprehension lest she might have committed
some venial sin in some of the words she had spoken to him, though he always
regarded her as a person accomplished in all virtues, and one of the most holy
souls he ever knew. In this fear he prayed for her with greater fervour than
before, and he was that instant favoured with the same vision a second time.
From that moment he was fully persuaded to the certainty of her glory. 7 Several miracles are related by the
bishop of Puy to have been performed by her, some whilst she was living, others
through her intercession, and by her relics after her death. Among others, he mentions
a young nun at Nemers, in the county of Maine, who had been struck with a
palsy, and confined to her bed seven weeks in the most deplorable and helpless
condition; but was on a sudden perfectly restored to her health, and the use of
her limbs, by invoking this servant of God, who was then lately deceased.
Whilst the community was singing the Te Deum for this miracle,
another nun, who was grievously afflicted with sickness, and whose legs were
swelled to an enormous size, begged the like favour through the intercession of
this saint, and found herself no less suddenly sound and well, so that the
choir sung a second Te Deum in thanksgiving immediately after
the first. Several other miracles were proved before commissaries, and declared
authentic in the process of her beatification, which was performed, and the
decree published, by Pope Benedict XIV. in 1751, who commanded her name to be
inserted in the Roman Martyrology. Clement XIV. by a decree, 2nd September,
1769, fixed her feast on the 21st of August.
The favourite maxims which this
saint inculcated to her spiritual children regarded humility, meekness, and
charity. “Humility,” said she, 8 “consists in this, that when others
humble us, we humble ourselves still more; when others accuse us, we add to
their accusations; when we are employed in mean offices, we sincerely own it is
more than we deserve; when we are cast by, we are well content. A religious
person cannot give a more evident mark of pride and incapacity, than to think
herself capable of anything. Did we but know how strangely those souls affront
the Spirit of God who raise themselves, or make ostentation by vanity, we
should be ready to pray that fire might fall from heaven upon us, rather than
to be guilty of this vice. I wish I could engrave this maxim with my blood. I
could wish my lips were bored with a hot iron, on condition that the mouths of
the religious might be always shut against the least word that breaks in upon
humility.” The saint will have mildness to be so perfect by our assiduity in
practising it with the most heroic dispositions, that it becomes, as it were,
the natural and constant frame of our souls, which no provocation must ever
disturb. Our saint had a wonderful address in tempering corrections and
reproofs with such tenderness and charity, as to give no one uneasiness; also
in concealing and bearing all personal injuries, and in repaying slanders,
curses, and affronts with blessings and favours. Her exhortations to her
sisters to bear with one another’s burdens, and to suffer nothing ever to cool
the sweetness of their charity towards every one, were most pathetic and
earnest; and she often put them in mind in what school we are educated. “With
whom,” said she, “did Jesus Christ converse? With a traitor, who sold him at a
cheap rate; with a thief, who reviled him in his last moments; with sinners and
proud Pharisees. Ah! shall we, at every shadow of an affront or contradiction,
show how little charity and patience we have!” She was ever inculcating how
enormous the sin of speaking against one’s neighbour is; especially where there
is the least shadow of envy or spite: and she often repeated, that whoever were
guilty of it, deserved to have their tongues cut out; wishing, that by the loss
of her own she could prevent this foul sin ever happening among her religious
sisters.
Note 1. To make a round of amusements or
idle visits the business of life, is to degrade the dignity of a rational
being, and to sink beneath the very brutes. Anciently not only amongst the
Hebrews, who enjoyed the light of faith and religion, but also amongst the
Gentiles, queens and empresses are always found in Homer and other writers at
their looms or distaffs, or busy in their domestic concerns, never idle, or at
play. Augustus Cæsar wore no other clothes than such as his wife and daughter
had spun or made with their own hands. Nature stands in need of relaxation for
the exercise of the body and unbending of the mind; but this may be so
contrived as to be useful and serious. At least it ought never to swallow up
too much of our precious time. It is not to be expressed how much any passion
for trifling amusements unsettles, enervates, and debases the mind, and
unhinges the whole frame of the soul; how strong an aversion to business, and
how torpid a sloth it generates; also what loathings, and how much emptiness,
fickleness, and bitterness, everywhere attend and pursue it. When through a
degeneracy of soul many shrunk first from a serious turn of mind, they chose
diversions which were martial and laborious. To the dregs of corruption in
manners was reserved the invention of slothful games and amusements. Cards, the
modish diversion of this age, were first discovered at the French court in the
fourteenth century. F. Daniel (Diss. sur l’Origine du Jeu de Piquet,
trouvée dans l’Histoire de France, published in the Mémoires de Trevoux, an.
1720) thinks in the reigns of Charles VI. and VII.
For the names and numbers of the cards admirably agree, by elegant
allusions, to the persons and transactions of that time. Mr. Bullet, professor
at Besançon, to whom the Mémoires sur la Langue Celtique have acquired an
immortal reputation, published, in 1757, a pamphlet entitled, Recherches
Historiques sur les Cartes à Jouer, avec des Notes Critiques, wherein he
corrects several mistakes of FF. Menestrier and Daniel on this subject, and
demonstrates that cards were invented four or five years before the death of
Charles V., and that they consist of military allusions. Even the queens have a
relation to the combats of chivalry, in which the ladies had a great share.
This game was soon after introduced in England, as appears from the word knave, for valet or servant; which it then signified with us, as
appears from Wickliff’s New Testament, kept in Westminster library, &c.,
where we read, Paul, the knave of Jesus Christ. Games at cards,
in which chance is chiefly predominant, fall under the censure of games of
hazard, which the laws of religion and natural justice capitally condemn. Those
games at cards in which dexterity and skill prevail, can only be tolerated or
allowed when the play is not deep, and there is no danger either of losing much
time at it, or of contracting an attachment to it. [
back]
Note 3. Entert. 20. [back]
Note 5. See Collet de Voto, S. Teresa, and
S. Andrew Avellini’s lives. [
back]
Note 6. This daughter, Mary of Rabutin,
heiress to her family, was afterwards married to Henry, marquis of Sevigné, and
has left to the latest posterity an authentic monument of her lively and
agreeable genius, good taste, and judgment in the easy, genteel, and spirited
style of her letters, full of wit and dignity, and an unrivalled model of a
familiar epistolary style, especially in her letters to her beloved daughter,
the Countess of Grignan. The letters which she did not write with her own hand,
but only dictated, are in every respect much inferior to the former; and those
who added the latter volumes to the two first, have, by serving the
booksellers, injured the world and her memory, and passed a gross imposition on
the public. The best edition of her letters, is that put out by Perrin in
1734. [
back]
Note 7. Collet, Vie de S. Vincent, t. 1, l. 4, p.
342. [
back]
Note 8. See her maxims in her life by Maupas
and Marsollier. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume
VIII: August. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
SOURCE :
http://www.bartleby.com/210/8/212.html
Santa Giovanna Francesca de Chantal
Religiosa
- Memoria Facoltativa
Digione, Francia, 1572 - Moulins, Francia, 13
dicembre 1641
La vita
di Giovanna Frémiot è legata indissolubilmente alla figura di Francesco di
Sales, suo direttore e guida spirituale, e di cui fu seguace e al tempo stesso
ispiratrice e collaboratrice. Nata a Digione nel 1572, a vent'anni sposò il
barone de Chantal, da cui ebbe numerosi figli. Rimasta vedova, avvertì sempre
di più il desiderio di ritirarsi dal mondo e di consacrarsi a Dio. Sotto la
guida di Francesco di Sales, diede vita a una nuova fondazione intitolata alla
Visitazione e destinata all'assistenza dei malati. L'Istituto si diffuse
rapidamente nella Savoia e nella Francia. Ben presto seguirono Giovanna,
diventata suor Francesca, numerose ragazze, le Visitandine, come erano chiamate
e universalmente note le suore dell'Isituto. Prima della sua morte, avvenuta a
Moulins il 13 dicembre del 1641, le case della Visitazione erano 75, quasi
tutte fondate da lei. (Avvenire)
Etimologia: Giovanna = il Signore è benefico, dono del Signore,
dall'ebraico
Martirologio Romano: Santa Giovanna Francesca Frémiot de Chantal,
religiosa: dal suo matrimonio cristiano ebbe sei figli, che educò alla pietà;
rimasta vedova, percorse alacremente sotto la guida di san Francesco di Sales
la via della perfezione, dedicandosi alle opere di carità soprattutto verso i
poveri e i malati; diede inizio all’Ordine della Visitazione di Santa Maria,
che diresse pure con saggezza. Il suo transito avvenuto a Moulins sulle rive dell’Allier vicino a
Nevers in Francia ricorre il 13 dicembre.
(13 dicembre: Nel monastero della Visitazione a Moulins in Francia,
anniversario della morte di santa Giovanna Francesca Frémiot de Chantal, la cui
memoria si celebra il 12 agosto).
Nella
storia della Chiesa troviamo alcuni casi in cui uomo e donna hanno agito
insieme nel cammino della santità, ricordiamo così Francesco e Chiara, Elzeario
di Sabran e Delfina di Glandève, Teresa d’Avila e Giovanni della Croce,
Benedetto e Scolastica, Luigi e Zelia Martin (genitori di santa Teresina di
Lisieux), Giulia e Carlo Tancredi di Barolo, i coniugi Beltrame. Altra “coppia”
sorprendente fu quella composta da san Francesco di Sales e Giovanna Francesca
Frémyot de Chantal. Fu infatti grazie all’incontro con il vescovo di Ginevra
che Giovanna definì il suo percorso di santità.
I
francesi la chiamano sainte Chantal e la venerano ad Annecy, dove riposa
accanto a san Francesco di Sales.
Nasce a
Digione il 23 gennaio 1572 in una famiglia dell’alta nobiltà borgognona. Suo
padre è Benigno Frémyot, secondo presidente del Parlamento. Rimasta ben presto
orfana di madre, crescerà sotto l’educazione e la morale paterne.
Il 29
dicembre 1592 Giovanna sposa Cristoforo II, barone di Chantal. Il loro è un
matrimonio felice. Viene da subito chiamata «la dama perfetta» per quel suo
prodigarsi nella tenuta di Bourbilly e per le attenzioni e premure che riserva
al consorte. Da questa unione perfetta nascono sei figli: i primi due muoiono
alla nascita, poi arrivano Celso Benigno, Maria Amata, Francesca e Carlotta.
Dolce,
serena, affabile, Giovanna è amata dai suoi familiari, come dalla servitù.
Quando Cristoforo si assenta dal castello per adempiere ai suoi impegni
di corte, Giovanna lascia gli abiti eleganti e si dedica ai poveri, ai quali
non offre solo denaro, ma la propria persona, servendoli. La sua carità si fa
immensa durante la carestia che colpisce la Borgogna nell’inverno 1600-1601. È
qui che la baronessa, senza ascoltare i borbottii di molti e incoraggiata dal consorte,
trasforma il maniero in un vero e proprio ospedale per ospitare madri e bambini
in difficoltà e si occupa della costruzione di un nuovo forno per poter
distribuire il pane a tutti coloro che bussano alla sua porta. Un giorno le
viene detto che nel granaio non è rimasto che un solo sacco di segala… e lei,
senza esitazioni, ordina di proseguire la distribuzione del pane, come prima…
la segala finirà al nuovo raccolto.
Ma ecco
giungere la prima grande prova, la morte di Cristoforo, ucciso da un colpo di
archibugio durante una battuta di caccia.
Resta
vedova a soli 29 anni, vedova e madre di quattro creature di cui la prima ha
solo cinque anni e l’ultima pochi giorni. Matura, in questo tempo di lutto e di
dolore, il desiderio di consacrarsi a Cristo, ma i doveri familiari non le
permettono una scelta di vita così drastica. In attesa di conoscere la volontà
di Dio, Giovanna si dedica totalmente ai figli, all’amministrazione della
casa e alla preghiera.
Il
suocero, barone di Chantal, la informa che deve subito trasferirsi da lui, a
Monthélon se desidera che i figli prendano parte all’eredità e lei accetta, pur
sapendo che nella residenza dell’anziano barone comanda una «servapadrona». Per
lungo tempo dovrà sopportare le angherie di quest’ultima.
Il suo
nome inizia a rendersi noto per la sua carità. Non è più chiamata «dama
perfetta», ma la «nostra buona signora».
Un’altra
difficile prova deve ora affrontare: la sua guida spirituale non comprende la
sua persona, non sa leggere la sua anima. Un giorno suo padre la invita
a Digione, questa volta per ascoltare il quaresimale del vescovo di
Ginevra, Francesco di Sales, la cui fama si diffonde sempre più in Savoia e in
tutta la Francia. Il primo incontro fra Giovanna e il vescovo avviene il 5
marzo del 1604. Da allora si instaura un camino di unione fraterna e spirituale
straordinario. La direzione spirituale di Francesco di Sales si realizza
soprattutto attraverso l’epistolario, dove l’umano è «divinizzato» e il divino
«umanizzato».
In una
lettera inviata al vescovo ginevrino Giovanna scrive: «… tutto quello che di
creato c’è quaggiù non è niente per me se paragonato al mio carissimo Padre… Un
giorno mi comandaste di distaccarmi e di spogliarmi di tutto. Oh Dio, quanto è
facile lasciare quello che è attorno a noi, ma lasciare la propria pelle, la
propria carne, le proprie ossa e penetrare nell’intimo delle midolla, che è, mi
sembra, quello che abbiamo fatto è una cosa grande, difficile e impossibile se
non alla grazia di Dio».
Nel 1610
firma di fronte al notaio un atto con il quale si spoglia di tutti i beni in
favore dei figli. Lascia dunque la famiglia e parte per Annecy e il 6
giugno, insieme a due compagne, Giacomina Favre e Giovanna Carlotta de Bréchard
entra nella piccola ed umile «casa della Galleria», culla dell’Ordine della
Visitazione.
Rimarrà
sempre “madre”, continuando ad amare profondamente e teneramente i suoi figli.
Nuove morti, nuovi lutti… tanto che soltanto la figlia Francesca le
sopravviverà tra figli, fratelli, generi e nuora. Perciò Dio diventa per lei
l’unica ricerca, l’unico fine della sua attuale vita. Alla scomparsa di
Francesco di Sales (28 dicembre 1622), Giovanna si trova sola alla guida della
nuova famiglia religiosa della Visitazione. Si fa pellegrina sulle strade di
Francia, fondando ben 87 case visitandine. Consumata «nell’amore di opera e
nell’opera di amore», come usava dire, si spegne il 13 dicembre 1641 nel
monastero di Moulins.
Le
«Lettere di amicizia e direzione» (tradotte per la prima volta in italiano, a
cura dei monasteri della Visitazione d’Italia) sono la testimonianza più viva
della grande spiritualità di Madre Chantal ed è la prova che fosse persona
troppo intelligente e “libera” per ridursi ad un’ombra anonima di san Francesco
di Sales.
Autore: Cristina
Siccardi
Jane Frances de Chantal in Basilique de la Visitation
in Annecy.
Den hellige Johanna Fransiska av Chantal (1572-1641)
Minnedag: 12.
august
Skytshelgen for
salesianerinnene og for en lykkelig forløsning
Den hellige Johanna Fransiska Frémyot (fr:
Jeanne-Françoise; lat: Joanna Francisca) ble født den 28. januar 1572 i Dijon i
Øst-Frankrike. Hun kom fra en lavadelsfamilie og var datter av den burgundiske
parlamentspresidenten Bénigne Frémyot, som var leder for det rojalistiske
partiet i den ligaen som sto bak triumfen til kong Henrik IV (1589-1610). Hun
mistet tidlig sin mor og ble sammen med sine søsken oppdratt av faren i en
streng katolsk tro, i en tid da mange adelige hadde gått over til den
kalvinistiske lære. Johanna, som ved fermingen tok navnet Fransiska, avviste
flere rike friere fordi de ikke var katolikker: «Jeg ville heller dø tusen
ganger enn å gifte meg med en fiende av Kirken...» Men som tyveåring giftet hun
seg i 1592 med den 27-årige Christophe de Rabutin, baron de Chantal. Han var offiser i den franske hær og tidligere en
dyktig duellant, som på morssiden stammet fra den salige Humbeline av Jully (ca 1092-ca 1136).
Bryllupet ble
feiret i Dijon, og få dager senere reiste Johanna med sin mann til hans sete på
slottet Bourbilly. Der fant hun at eiendommen og
husholdningen hadde forfalt etter at mannens mor døde, og hun gjorde det til
sin første oppgave å gjeninnføre orden og et godt styre. Ekteskapet var svært
lykkelig og de fikk seks barn, men de tre eldste døde tidlig, mens en sønn og
to døtre vokste opp. Johanna var en trofast hustru, hengiven mor og dyktig
oppdrager av sine barn. Mannen var ofte borte på politiske oppdrag, og når hun
ble kritisert for at hun ikke kledde seg standsmessig, svarte hun: «De øynene
jeg vil behage, er akkurat nå mange mil borte».
Men i 1601, etter bare ni års ekteskap, var mannen på
jakt sammen med vennen M. de Aulézy. Omstendighetene er ikke klare, men ved et
uhell skjøt vennen baronen i låret. Han levde i ni dager mens han led store
smerter under de mislykkede operasjonsforsøkene til en klossete kirurg, og han
mottok sakramentene med oppbyggelig ro og resignasjon før han døde. Han tilga
også sin venn M. de Aulézy og sa til ham: «Ikke begå den synd å hate deg selv
når du ikke har gjort noe galt».
Johanna Fransiska satt nå alene igjen med fire barn,
den yngste datteren var bare to uker gammel. Hun gikk deretter gjennom tre år
med dyp depresjon og sorg. Hun forsøkte å skjule dette av frykt for å bli en
byrde for andre. Hun overtok fadderskapet til de Aulézys barn etter sin mann. I
løpet av sørgeåret hentet faren henne til huset i Dijon, hvor hun bodde sammen
med barna. Men av hensyn til barnas arv måtte hun ta dem med og dra til Monthelon
ved Autun for å bo sammen med svigerfaren, som da var 75 år gammel. Den gamle
baron de Chantal behandlet henne ydmykende. Samme år som ektemannen døde,
bestemte hun seg for å leve i evig kyskhet og vie seg til oppdragelsen av
barna, mens hun lette etter en åndelig veileder.
Da en prest tilbød seg å bli hennes åndelige veileder,
aksepterte hun takknemlig. Men han viste seg å være både hard og ufølsom. Han
tynget henne ned med bønner, observanser, faste og askese som var helt
upassende for en kvinne i hennes ulykkelige situasjon. Han tvang henne også til
å love fire ting: At hun ville adlyde ham i alle ting, at hun aldri skulle gå
til en annen veileder, at hun ville holde alt han sa til henne hemmelig og at
hun ikke skulle snakke om sitt indre liv med noen andre. Hun slet med dette
ulykkelige forholdet i tre år.
I 1604 holdt den
hellige Frans av Sales, biskop av Genève, fasteprekener i Sainte-Chapelle i
Dijon, og Johanna dro for å bo hos sin far slik at hun fikk muligheten å høre
en så berømt predikant. Hun gjenkjente ham som den personen hun en
gang hadde sett i en visjon, og visste at han var den åndelige veilederen som
hun lenge hadde tryglet Gud om å sende henne. Etter noen innledende
vanskeligheter gikk han med på å være hennes åndelige veileder.
Nå fulgte det et vennskap mellom dem som er et av de
mest fullkomne i helgenhistorien. De førte en livlig korrespondanse, men
dessverre er bare biskopens brev bevart. De viser imidlertid hvilke åndelige
høyder Johanna må ha nådd. Etter Frans' råd regulerte hun sine andaktsøvelser
og andre øvelser slik at hun tilpasset seg det hun skyldte verden så lenge hun
bodde i husene til faren og svigerfaren. Hun fulgte en streng leveregel, viet
mye av sin tid til barna, besøkte de fattige som var syke i nabolaget og våket
hele netter hos de som var døende.
Johanna viet seg totalt til Gud og ble svært inspirert
av sine kontakter med karmelittnonnene i Dijon. Etter mange åndelige renselser
oppnådde hun kontemplativ bønn. Hun fortalte Frans om sine planer om å gå inn i
et karmelittkloster, og han brukte litt tid på svaret og forela saken for Gud.
Men i 1607 Frans sa at han hadde en bedre ide. Han kom da med sin plan om en ny
religiøs orden uten klausur for kvinner, og de inngikk et samarbeid.
Men først sørget hun for sine barn. Hennes eldste
datter ble gift med Frans' bror, og en annen datter ble også gift, mens hennes
bror, erkebiskopen av Bourges, tok seg av oppdragelsen av sønnen. Da hun skulle
forlate hjemmet, skjedde en nokså melodramatisk episode med hennes eneste sønn,
den 14-årige Celse-Bénigne. Han ville hindre henne i å dra, og la seg over
dørterskelen. Hennes bror spurte: «Kan et barns tårer ikke endre din
beslutning?» Hennes svar var: «Nei, men jeg er en mor.» Deretter tok hun et
stort skritt over guttens kropp og forlot huset.
Deretter grunnla Johanna i 1610 etter Frans' råd
Besøkelsesordenen eller «Ordenen av Marias gjesting hos Elisabeth» (Ordo
de Visitatione Beatae Mariae Virginis – OVM), hvor søstrene ble kalt
salesianerinner eller visitasjonssøstre, og de viet seg til pleie av de syke og
omsorg for de fattige. Frans hadde skaffet et hus i Annecy i Savoia, sør for
Genève. Det ble kalt Gallerihuset og lå ved bredden av innsjøen Lac d'Annecy.
Han vigslet sitt kloster på Treenighetssøndagen i 1610.
Sammen med Johanna mottok samme år to andre søstre
ordensdrakten fra Frans' hånd, Maria Favre og Charlotte de Bréchard, samt
tjeneren Anne Coste, og ti andre sluttet seg snart til dem. Frans skrev regelen
for den nye kongregasjonen, som utmerket seg ved sin spesielle mildhet. Besøkelsesordenen
ble bestemt for enslige kvinner og enker, som på grunn av sin alder, helse
eller andre grunner ikke var egnet til andre ordenssamfunns strengere liv. Han
ville at de skulle leve uten klausur, slik at de friere kunne ta på seg arbeid
for legeme og sjel.
Det at de levde blant de syke og fattige, vakte mye
oppsikt, kritikk og anstøt. Opprøret i folket gikk så vidt at Frans i 1615
etter krav fra erkebiskop de Marquemont av Lyon så seg tvunget til å forandre
ordenen, innføre streng klausur og foreskrive Augustins regel for den, med
tilleggskonstitusjoner som var beundringsverdige i sin klokskap og moderasjon.
Kongregasjonen måtte oppgi sykepleien som oppgave og i stedet gå inn for
oppdragelse av ungdommen. Denne holdningen var forårsaket av lutherske angrep
på slappheten i visse klostre, og de romerske myndighetene fant det nesten
umulig å innrømme respektabiliteten til «uklausurerte» nonner. Den
hellige Angela
Merici og den ærverdige Maria Ward var to andre grunnleggere som møtte
lignende vanskeligheter på denne tiden, men de hadde større suksess i å
gjennomføre sine opprinnelige ideer. Frans skrev spesielt for Johanna og hennes
mer erfarne søstre sin berømte avhandling «Om Guds kjærlighet».
Johanna Fransiska tok ledelsen av det første
ordenshuset i Annecy med omtrent et dusin nonner. I begynnelsen var det lett
nok å styre aspirantene som trådte inn i ordenen, men senere, da døtre fra
adelsfamilier trådte inn, ble Madame de Chantals dyktighet og takt virkelig
satt på prøve; mange av dem var overforfinede, sårbare og ignorante, og følte
at deres høye byrd ga dem rett til å avvise alle kjedelige oppgaver. Mange av
enkene var også irriterende selvsentrerte. Men Johanna Fransiska var fullt ut i
stand til å klare dette og gikk videre med å grunnlegge flere klostre.
Johanna ble ofte tvunget til å forlate klosteret i
Annecy på grunn av sine barns affærer og for å grunnlegge flere klostre. Året
etter at hun ble ikledd døde hennes far, og hun dro til Dijon for å ordne opp i
hans saker. Hun ble der i tre måneder, og fikk også sønnen inn på et kollegium.
Etter at det hadde blitt grunnlagt klostre i Lyons, Moulins, Grenoble og
Bourges, sendte Frans bud etter henne fra Paris for å grunnlegge et hus der. Med
denne grunnleggelsen i 1619 kom vendepunktet, til tross for åpen fiendtlighet
og skjulte intriger.
Johanna styrte klosteret i Paris i tre år, og i denne
tiden var den hellige Vincent av Paul rådgiver
for det etter ønske fra Frans av Sales. Johanna lærte å kjenne Angélique
Arnauld, abbedisse i Port-Royal, som imidlertid ikke fikk tillatelse til å
trekke seg fra sitt embete og slutte seg til Besøkelsesordenen som hun hadde
ønsket. Før Johannas død var det 86 hus i Besøkelsesordenen. Fremgangen
skyldtes Frans' undervisning og skrifter og hans understreking av ydmykhet og
saktmodighet heller enn legemlig askese, samt Johannas klokskap og hengivenhet.
Frans av Sales' død den 28. desember 1622 ble et
voldsomt slag for Johanna, men hennes overgivelse til den guddommelige vilje
gjorde at hun bar sorgen med urokket standhaftighet. Etter dette var hun alene
med ansvaret for å bygge ut og styrke ordenen, og hun sørget for å utgi Frans'
skrifter. Et nytt slag kom da hennes 30-årige sønn Celse-Bénigne ble drept i
kampen mot hugenottene og engelskmennene på Île de Ré i 1627. Han etterlot seg
hustru og en datter som ennå ikke var fylt ett år. Datteren skulle bli kjent
som den berømte Madame de Sévigné. Han hadde vært en uforbederlig duellant, og
hun hadde bedt om at han ville få den nåde å dø en kristen død.
I 1628 herjet en fryktelig pest i Frankrike, Savoia og
Piemonte, og den skapte store lidelser i flere av ordenens klostre. Da pesten
nådde Annecy, nektet Johanna å forlate byen. I stedet stilte hun alle
klosterets ressurser til de sykes disposisjon, noe som inspirerte de lokale
myndighetene til å sette inn adekvate tiltak for de syke og etterlatte. I 1632
kom nyheten om at Celse-Bénignes enke var død, og deretter døde hennes høyt
elskede svigersønn Antonius de Toulonjon og Mikael Favre, Frans' skriftefar og
en nær og hengiven venn av visitasjonssøstrene. Men Johanna kom seg over både
disse og andre tap, sykdom og religiøse prøvelser. For hun var i lange perioder
plaget av indre kvaler, mørke og åndelig tørrhet, til tider i en fryktelig
grad, noe som fremgår av flere av hennes brev. Men hun kjempet seg gjennom
prøvelsene og var aktiv til det siste, og ingen så på hennes glade ansikt hvor
mye hun led i sjelen.
Johanna forente et dypt religiøst liv med stor
administrativ dyktighet og karakterstyrke. Hun var kompromissløs, følsom og
temmelig intens. Frans sa at han i henne hadde funnet «den perfekte kvinne, som
Salomo lette etter, men ikke fant i Jerusalem». Vincent av Paul, som kjente
henne personlig og godt, sa om henne at hun var «et av de helligste mennesker
jeg noensinne har møtt på denne jord».
I 1635 og 1636 foretok Johanna systematiske besøk til
alle klostrene i sin orden. Antallet var nå oppe i 65, og mange av dem hadde
aldri sett sin grunnlegger og åndelige mor. I 1641 dro hun til Frankrike i et
veldedig ærend for Madame de Montmorency. Det ble hennes siste reise. Hun ble
invitert til Paris av dronningen, Anna av Østerrike, og til hennes bedrøvelse
ble hun der møtt med store hedersbevisninger.
På tilbakeveien ble hun syk i Besøkelsesklosteret
Moulais i departementet Allier, og der døde hun den 13. desember 1641, 69 år
gammel, etter å ha skrevet et avskjedsbrev til søstrene. Hun hadde da deltatt i
grunnleggelsen av 86 klostre i ordenen. Hennes legeme ble ført til Annecy og
bisatt i ordenskirken i Monastère de la Visitation ved siden av Frans
av Sales. Hennes hjerte og øyne ble gitt til klosteret i Nevers.
Hennes saligkåringsprosess ble svært forsinket, og
ikke før 81 år etter hennes død ble hennes grav beordret åpnet for å foreta den
foreskrevne identifikasjonen av relikviene. Den 1. desember 1722 samlet
biskopen av Genève, de apostoliske kommisjonærene, prinsesse Eléanor-Philippine
og søstrene i kommuniteten i Annecy seg for å bevitne åpningen av graven.
Senere ble det foretatt en rekke translasjoner av
relikviene. Den uvanligste var i 1793 under Den franske revolusjon, da søstrene
fikk ordre om å forlate klosteret. For å beskytte relikviene av Johanna og
Frans gjemte søstrene dem i all hast i en madrass og fraktet den i en båt over
innsjøen til Château de Duingt, som tilhørte familien til en av søstrene. De
religiøse myndighetene ble varslet om at de urnene som tidligere hadde
inneholdt de helliges relikvier, nå inneholdt andre skjeletter. I 1806 da
freden var gjenopprettet, ble Frans' relikvier flyttet til katedralen og
Johannas til kirken Saint-Maurice. I 1912 ble begges jordiske rester overført
til nye graver. Både hennes og Frans' relikvier hviler nå i koret i
Besøkelseskatedralen.
Salesianerinnenes ordens drakt er svart med et hvitt
bryststykke, et brystkors av sølv og to tøybånd hengende fra beltet foran.
Besøkelsesordenen har særlig utmerket seg i utbredelsen av
Jesu-Hjerte-andakten. En som også tilhørte ordenen, var den hellige Margareta Maria
Alacoque, og hennes høyeste anliggende var tilbedelsen av Jesu helligste
hjerte.
Johanna Fransiska ble saligkåret den 21. november 1751
(dokumentet (Breve) var datert den 13. november) av pave Benedikt XIV (1740-58)
og helligkåret den 16. juli 1767 av pave Klemens XIII (1758-69). Hennes navn
står i Martyrologium Romanum. Hennes festdag ble skrevet inn i den romerske
kalenderen i 1769 og lagt til 21. august, som er dagen for grunnleggelsen av
ordenen. Ved kalenderrevisjonen i 1969 ble hennes fest flyttet til 12.
desember, ikke dødsdagen den 13. desember fordi det er festdagen for den
hellige Lucia.
I 2002 ble hennes minnedag flyttet til 12. august, men vi har ikke klart å
finne ut hvorfor dette skjedde og hvorfor den datoen ble valgt.
Johanna fremstilles som ordenskvinne i
Besøkelsesordenens drakt, i høyre hånd et hjerte med navnet Jesus, i venstre en
bok. Hun er skytshelgen for sin orden og for en lykkelig forløsning.
Se også «Frans av Sales og
Jesu-Hjerte-fromheten» (Hjertet som religiøst bilde i utvalgte tekster
av Frans av Sales – Hovedoppgave i kristendomskunnskap av Susanne Anette
Kjekshus Koch, Universitetet i Oslo, Det teologiske fakultet, våren 1996).
SOURCE : http://www.katolsk.no/biografier/historisk/jchantal
