Thursday, April 11 marks the 225th anniversary of the Foundation of the Institute of the Sisters of Charity of St. Jeanne Antide Thouret in Besançon, France.
The Congregation will celebrate in multiple ways in its provinces scattered around the world.
In Besançon, where the General Council and the two European Councils are right now, the anniversary will be celebrated by the Congregation with a Eucharistic Celebration of Thanksgiving to God.
Besançon – 225th anniversary of the Foundation of the Institute of the Sisters of Charity of St. Jeanne Antide Thouret
On April 11, 1799, in Besançon, while the Revolution was tormenting the entire country, a woman was sent by the Church to the service of the poor.
St. Jeanne Antide thus recalls the words addressed to her on the day she was sent on mission: “You will gather the youths whom you will form as you have been formed and you will come to Besançon to set up an establishment for the instruction of youth and to assist the sick”.
So she opened the first school, a spark lit in a town sorely tested by the wounds of the Revolution: so many sick people, abandoned and illiterate young people, so many poor people: “I opened at Besançon, rue des Martelots, a school free of charge to teach the young girls….I was alone to teach, but the Good God deigned“.
Many girls joined her, to contribute to the work of re-evangelization that awaited the French Church following the Revolution.
The strength and courage of that response to pastoral and social challenges reaches us.
The Sisters and Lay Friends give thanks to the Lord for the gift of the Spirit, which stirred the missionary ardor in St. Jeanne Antide, her love for the Church, her tenderness for the poor.
