St. Louis Mary de Montfort Priest, Confessor, Founder

St. Louis Mary de Montfort is also known as St. Louis Grignion de Montfort and St. Louis Mary Grignion. He was born on January 31, 1673, in Montfort in Brittany, France, the eldest of eight children in a very poor family. He entered the college in Rennes, France, at the age of twelve, where he was educated by the Jesuits.

In 1693 he moved to Paris to study for the priesthood but was too poor to be admitted to Saint Sulpice seminary and went to a small school. He resided in a student hostel, but the living conditions were so deplorable that he became seriously ill and was hospitalized. Once he recovered, he was admitted to Saint Sulpice, completed his studies, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1700 at the age of twenty-seven.

Because of his personal experience of poverty and illness, and observing the terrible disparity between the rich and poor in France, he felt called to dedicate his priestly ministry to the service of the poor and sick. He went as a traveling missionary throughout the poorest neighborhoods in Paris preaching the gospel and teaching the catechism. He also served the sick as the chaplain in the hospital in Portiers, France, where he spearheaded the reorganization of the hospital staff. It met with fierce opposition due to resistance to change, his high expectations, his abrasive personality, and jealousy toward him because of his dynamism and success. There was so much upheaval that he was forced to resign, but before his departure in 1703 he founded a congregation of women religious known as the Daughters of Divine Wisdom.

He continued his missionary preaching to the poor, but his critics intervened and protested to the bishop of Portiers who banned him from preaching in the diocese. He subsequently went to Rome in 1706, met Pope Clement XI, impressed him with his passion to preach to the poor, received a papal appointment as a “missionary apostolic,” and was commissioned to return to Brittany to resume his preaching which he did for the rest of his life.

His sermons were very emotional, and he stirred a great spiritual revival in Brittany. He would have the members of his audience bring their irreligious books to his mission and then conduct a dramatic book burning. He would also roleplay the death of a sinner and the furious struggle for the sinner’s soul between his guardian angel and the devil. He had a deep devotion to Mary and was a vigorous proponent of the Rosary. He wrote many articles about Mary and composed a number of Marian prayers and hymns. His most famous work is True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin which was very popular and influential for over two centuries. His spirituality of Mary is considered a bit excessive since Vatican II because it overstates Mary’s role in redemption and recommends that Christians be “slaves” of Mary.

In 1715 he founded the Missionaries of the Company of Mary [S.M.M.], also known as the Company of Mary or the Monfort Fathers, a group of priests and brothers who shared his missionary zeal, devotion to Mary, and desire to serve the poor. At first there were only two priests and several brothers, but today the congregation has 850 members worldwide.

St. Louis Mary de Montfort died at Saint-Laurent-sur-Sevre, France, in 1716, at the age of forty-three, was beatified in 1888, and canonized a saint in 1947.