St. Vincent de Paul (1581-1660)

St. Vincent was born of poor parents in the village of Pouy in Gascony. He enjoyed his first schooling under the Franciscan Fathers at Dax.
In 1596, he went to the University of Toulouse for theological studies, and there he was ordained priest in 1600.

After a brief visit to Rome he returned to France , where he became preceptor in the family of Emmanuel de Gondy.
In 1617, after encountering the needs of a poor sick family and inspiring an outpouring of generosity by parishioners, he canonically established a group of lay women to provide organized material service to the poor: the Confraternities of Charity. The group evolved into the Ladies of Charity, an organization of lay women who offer care, concern, and relief to the poor.

At the age of 44, Vincent formally founded the Congregation of the Mission with the financial help of Madame de Gondi to evangelize the rural poor.
A few years later, Vincent co-founded the Daughters of Charity with Louise de Marillac, to help the Ladies in their service of the sick and the poor -- doing the harder work to which the Ladies of Paris were not accustomed or suited.

Louise de Marillac, took 12 peasant girls in 1633 to work among the poor. She called them the Company of the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul Servants of the Poor. They were the first uncloistered community of religious women.

The Daughters went on to become involved in hospitals, prisons and the care for abandoned children. By 1780, there were 430 houses of the Daughters of Charity in France , 20 in Poland and one in Spain .
Today, the Daughters of Charity currently number 27,223 members in five continents with 81 provinces.

Vincent de Paul, who died in 1660, was declared Patron Saint of all works of charity by Pope Leo XIII and was canonized June 16, 1737.