SAINTS OF THE DAY

MONDAY, 28 APRIL, 2025

1) SAINT LOUIS MARIE GRIGNION DE MONTFORT

2) SAINT PETER CHANEL
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1) SAINT LOUIS MARIE GRIGNION DE MONTFORT

PRIEST, AUTHOR AND FOUNDER

(1673-1716)

BIRTH IN MONTFORT

Louis Marie Grignion was born in the hamlet of Montfort, a Breton village about thirteen miles east of Rennes, on 31 January 1673. Later, as an itinerant preacher, he preferred to drop his surname and be called simply Louis Marie de Montfort, or le Pére de Montfort, the Father from Montfort. The second of eighteen children, Louis was one of the few who survived to adulthood. He was born into a family of deep Catholic faith, in an area of France renowned for its dynamic Christian life.

JESUIT EDUCATION

At the age of eleven, Louis Marie set out for Rennes, the capital of Brittany, to enroll in the Jesuit College of Thomas à Becket. The young student from Montfort was considered by his teachers to be intelligent, religious, artistic in nature and somewhat shy. It was under the guidance of the Jesuits that Louis's priestly vocation matured. The decision to enter the priesthood was made, so he tells us, at the Shrine of Our Lady in the Carmelite Church in Rennes. After eight years at the Jesuit College, Louis Marie decided to pursue his theological studies at Saint Sulpice in Paris. At the age of nineteen, a new chapter opened in his life. The young man bade farewell to family and friends at the bridge of Cess on the outskirts of Rennes.

STUDIES IN PARIS

Having left all, he crossed the Cesson bridge to a new life of total dependence upon Divine Providence. So convinced was he that God was truly his loving Father that he gave his money, baggage and clothes to the first beggars he met. Begging for food and shelter along the way, he walked to Paris, arriving in the rags of a mendicant.

For the first two years, Montfort attended classes at the Sorbonne. The following six years of theological study, however, were spent under the tutelage of the Sulpicians themselves. Like the Jesuits, they found the student from Montfort to be a talented man of deep faith, intensely studious and strongly devoted to Our Lady. He was notable for the practical love he showed for the poor, for his desire to serve the outcasts of Paris society, and for a determination to live the gospel by identifying with the most neglected.

A MAN OF THE BIBLE

All his life, but especially as a seminarian, Montfort was an avid reader, and thoroughly enjoyed his task as librarian at Saint Sulpice. Above all else, he was a man of the Bible. The Sacred Scriptures were his constant companion, and his sermons and writings – five major works in all – abound with biblical texts. Louis yearned to proclaim the Good News of God's love to the outcasts, to assure them of the love of Jesus and of the maternal care of Mary.

FIRST MASS

At the Lady Chapel in the parish church of Saint Sulpice, Father Louis Marie Grignion celebrated his first Mass on 5 June 1700. From the age of eleven, he had completed sixteen years of formal study to reach this goal. Yet Montfort's priestly ministry itself would last only a further sixteen years.

UNSETTLED

After a few years of preaching parish renewals and ministering to the destitute at the poor-house at Poitiers, Louis Mary was far from settled. He found it extremely difficult to discover how to implement his belief that God was calling him to serve the poor and to identify with them.

MEETING THE POPE

His solution was simple. This unknown young priest from western France would seek the advice of the Pope. And so he set out on foot from Poitiers, begging for food and shelter along the arduous and dangerous routes to the Holy City.

In June 1706, Montfort met with Pope Clement XI (Giovanni Fancesco Albani 1700-21), pouring out his heart to the Vicar of Christ. Strangely, the Holy Father clearly saw in this young priest extraordinary gifts of God. He turned down Louis Marie's offer to proclaim the gospel in the wilds of Canada or in the Far East. Rather, the Pope named him Apostolic Missionary, telling him to return to his native land and renew the Church there.

He spent the rest of his life conducting approximately two hundred missions and retreats throughout the villages and towns of western France, proclaiming the gospel of God's love with Spirit-filled power.

MIXED REACTION

De Montfort's bold, charismatic proclamation of God's love was heard in churches, barracks, poor-houses, and even in houses of prostitution. His preaching was a source of admiration for many, of resentment and, sadly, anger for others. His life-style as a poor, vagabond preacher, with a knapsack strung across his shoulder to carry his Bible, breviary and notebooks, was not considered dignified for a cleric. Several times the episcopal authorities forbade him to preach in one diocese or another. Always obedient, Montfort would move on.

IDENTIFIED WITH THE POOR

With utter disdain for human respect, this saintly man identified with the poor, and found his greatest joy in opening for them the Word of God and offering them whatever material help he could locate. Typical of his actions was the event recorded in Dinan – probably one of many similar acts on his part – when the missionary tenderly embraced a dying, leprous beggar lying in the street, and carried him to a nearby religious house, crying out to the doorkeeper: ‘Open up to Jesus Christ!'

To the majority of the people, Father Louis Marie was simply the Good Father from Montfort. At times he was named the Father with the Big Rosary, for he ordinarily had a large rosary attached to the cord-like belt of his cassock.

ATTRACTING THOUSANDS

His preaching, flowing from his own experience of God's love and Mary's maternal care, attracted thousands back to the faith. In a Jansenistic age which harshly stressed the distance between God and his people, he recommended even daily communion, a tender devotion to the Mother of God, and a total surrender to Jesus in Mary.

UNDETERRED TILL HIS DEATH

Because of the style and contents of his preaching, this Elijah-like prophet was regarded by quite a few as no more than a strange misfit. He was poisoned on one occasion and, although it did not prove fatal, it caused his health to deteriorate even more rapidly. Other attempts were made on his life, yet Montfort was not deterred.

The Bishop of La Rochelle, Mgr Stephen de Champflour, proved a great friend to him, although others continued to oppose him, and there was even an attempt made on his life. Together with the Bishop, he established free schools for the poor boys and girls of La Rochelle, and called Marie Louise Trichet and Catherine Brunet, who had waited patiently in Poitiers for 10 years, to come to help him. At last, they made their religious profession and the congregation of the Daughters of Wisdom was born. Soon there were others too who joined them.

Worn out by hard work and sickness, Louis Marie finally came in April 1716 to Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvre to begin the mission which was to be his last. During it, he fell ill and died on 28 April. Thousands gathered for his burial in the parish church, and very quickly there were stories of miracles performed at his tomb

‘SLAVES OF JESUS CHRIST'

His writings call for a loving, formal acceptance of who we truly are: the slaves of Jesus Christ. The term ‘slave' always had, for Montfort, the evangelical connotation that we belong to the Lord, that we are loved by him, and that we are redeemed by the Incarnation and total offering of the Incarnate Wisdom for us.

THE TRUE DEVOTION TO MARY

But the surest, the easiest, the happiest, the most perfect way to Jesus Christ is through Mary. And this brings us to the great genius of Saint Louis Marie in explaining Our Lady's role in the redemption of mankind. In his treatise on True Devotion To The Blessed Virgin, he wrote, “It is through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that he has to reign in the world... It was through Mary that the salvation of the world was begun, and it is through Mary that it must be consummated... He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father.

“It is necessary for the greater knowledge and glory of the Most Holy Trinity, that Mary should be more than ever known... Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might, and in grace in these later times:

1. in MERCY to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church;
2. in MIGHT, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Jews, and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God...;
3. and finally, she must shine forth in GRACE, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ who shall battle for His interests.

“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world's esteem... and persecuted as the heel is by other members of the body. But in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly.”

Who shall these servants, slaves, and children of Mary be? The saint answers himself: “They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere.” And “they shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful' Mary to pierce her enemies.”

HOW DOES ONE BECOME A SLAVE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN?

The easiest way is by first carefully studying 'TRUE DEVOTION TO MARY', for which Pope Saint Pius X granted an Apostolic Benediction. Then by confidently making, and faithfully living by, the following:

'ACT OF CONSECRATION TO THE MOTHER OF GOD'
Composed by Saint Louis Marie de Montfort:

In the presence of all the Heavenly Court I choose thee this day for my Mother and Mistress. I deliver and consecrate to thee, as thy slave, my body and soul, my goods, both interior and exterior, and even the value of all my good actions, past, present and future; leaving to thee the entire and full right of disposing of me, and all that belongs to me, without exception, according to thy good pleasure, to the greatest glory of God, in time and in eternity. Amen.
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2) SAINT PETER CHANEL

PRIEST AND MARTYR

(12 July, 1803 – 28th April, 1841)

St Peter Chanel was born on 12 July 1803, the fifth of eight children in a farming family with a small holding in south-western France. The area was still troubled by the political instability that followed the Revolution. That, plus the need to help on the farm, meant his primary schooling was rather fragmented. He grew up in rural France working as a shepherd. While in school he loved to read about French foreign missionaries and wanted to emulate them. So he decided, “I will become a missionary priest!” 

In his early teens the parish priest helped him with special lessons in the presbytery, so that at 16 he was ready to begin his four years of secondary education at the minor seminary. He progressed to the major seminary to be ordained at 24 as a priest for the Belley diocese. For his first year of priesthood he was assistant in a medium sized town, already thinking seriously about applying for an apostolate in the foreign missions. Then followed three years as parish priest in a small country town where the Church was still in disarray a generation after the Revolution. With quiet zeal, tact and compassion he transformed it. Underlying his approach was his personal motto ˙Aimer Marie et faire l'aimer' – to love Mary and bring others to love her.

In 1831, at 28, with his bishop's agreement he joined the small group of diocesan priests who had hopes of starting a Society of Mary. He was one of the three representatives who went to Rome to ask the Pope's approval for their planned Society of Mary. This approval was given in April 1836 when Marists accepted responsibility for new missions in the little-known south-west Pacific. By the end of that year Peter was one of the first band of missionaries, four priests and three catechist brothers, attached to Bishop Pompallier, who sailed from Le Havre on Christmas Eve for this pioneering mission. He became one of the founding members of the Society of Mary, the Marists. And as a Marist father, he voyaged on the high seas to at last fulfill his missionary dreams.

After a prolonged journey out to the Pacific fact-finding and considering possibilities, on All Saints Day 1837 Pompallier placed Fr Peter Bataillon and Br Joseph Luzy on Wallis Island, in an island group north of Fiji. A week later he founded a second mission, leaving Fr Peter Chanel and Br Marie-Nizier Delorme 170km away on Futuna, the smaller island of the two. By then the Bishop had decided to make his base in New Zealand and, via Sydney, landed in Hokianga on 10 January 1838. 

For three and a half years on Futuna, Chanel and Marie-Nizier battled with language difficulties, strange customs and food, sickness, malnutrition, loneliness. Hardest to bear was the seeming lack of success in adult conversions. But they persevered, living and preaching the Gospel, in spite of the king's tolerance wearing thin. Father Chanel gave his all, at first drip by drip and then all at once. A lay brother who was with him later said of Father Chanel, “Because of his labors he was often burned by the heat of the sun, and famished with hunger, and he would return home wet with perspiration and completely exhausted. Yet he always remained in good spirits, courageous and energetic…” His apostolic labors generated few converts, but there was some progress nonetheless. Like so many missionaries, Peter had to overcome the counter-witness given by fellow European Christians trading in the area who cared little about their religion. 

The eventual conversion of the king's son proved to be Peter's death warrant. The king kept control of his people largely through their worship of evil spirits. His son's becoming a Christian undermined this power, so Peter had to be stopped. With the king's approval a small group of his tribal leaders clubbed Peter with an axe until his blood puddled in the dirt while Marie-Nizier was absent visiting elsewhere. It was on 28th April 1841. Father Peter was not yet forty years old when his missionary dream was fulfilled in martyrdom, giving Oceania its patron saint.

When he heard the news of Peter's brutal death, Pompallier sailed to Wallis, accompanied by Fr Philippe Viard, later to be the first bishop of Wellington. Viard went ashore on Futuna, refusing any armed escort, and gathered Peter's remains which were then brought to New Zealand. These were kept reverently at Kororareka (Russell) till 1849 when they were returned to France.

The island of Futuna, in which our saint had such mixed success, converted completely and totally a few years after Saint Peter's martyrdom. Musumusu (who killed St. Peter) himself repented of his crime and was baptized. The island is, even in modern times, almost one hundred percent Catholic. An impressive church is the heart and center of every small town. Saint Peter Chanel's body now rests in a large Basilica in the city of Poi. The beauty and smell of tropical flowers always adorn the church. And on the night of April 27, the vigil of his Feast Day, hundreds of Futunians sleep outside the Basilica waiting for the festivities of their saint's feast day to begin the next morning. The brief life and sudden death of Saint Peter Chanel is powerful proof of how the blood of the martyrs waters the seeds of the Church. One sows, another reaps, and still another enjoys the harvest.

He was officially declared a martyr and beatified in 1889.He was declared a saint by Pope Pius XII in 1954.

PATRON: of Oceania.

PRAYER: Saint Peter Chanel, by your suffering and death, you converted a people. You were fearless in adventuring far from home to preach the Gospel. May your blood, spilled so long ago, continue to infuse all missionaries with courage and perseverance in their labors. Amen.