A Saint For Our Times: St. Louis de Montfort

This Short Article May Serve as a Brief Overview of the Life and Spirituality of St. Louis de Montfort, . . .

SINCE his beatification in 1888, and more especially since his canonization in 1947, . . .

. . . Saint Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort (1673 – 1716) has been repeatedly extolled by the magisterium of the Church. His life and writings have been proposed as authentic expressions of the Church’s teachings. Or to use the words of Pope Pius XII, as “flagrans, solida ac recta” (vibrant, solid and correct). The love of Pope John Paul Il for this vagabond preacher is well known. The Pope openly declared his admiration for the saint. He has also chosen Montfort’s short formula of consecration (cf. True #233) as his episcopal motto, the motto which he has retained and continually uses as Supreme Pontiff.

Saint Louis-Marie has had, as Father Faber noted in 1862, “a remarkable influence on the Church and bid(s) fair to have a much wider influence in years to come. His preaching, his writing and his conversation were all impregnated with prophecy and with anticipations of the later ages of the Church.” Fulfilling Faber’s prediction, these last several years have seen a notable resurgence of interest in the life and teachings of this itinerant French missionary who flourished around the time of the “Sun King,” Louis XIV. Although his literary style is understandably not ours, Montfort’s truly charismatic writings appear to capture the spirit and yearnings of our times.

. . . Truly A Saint For Our Times

So that the teachings of this missionary may be more clearly understood and, as the Church wishes, have a wider influence among the People of God, the complete works of Saint Louis de Montfort have been published in English, and biographies of the saint are numerous (copies may be purchased from Montfort Publications).

This short article may serve as a brief overview of the life and spirituality of St. Louis de Montfort. Truly a saint for our times.

His Name

The town of Montfort, a Breton hamlet about thirteen miles east of Rennes, is important in any biographical sketch of Louis-Marie Grignion. Yet its significance does not lie in the fact that it was there that he was born on January 31, 1673. At least for the saint himself, it appears that he linked himself by name to this town because it was there that he was baptized into Christ Jesus. It is for this reason that as an itinerant preacher he preferred to drop his surname, Grignion. His desire is to be called simply, Louis-Marie of Montfort. Or even more simply, the Father from Montfort (le Perex de Montfort). His stress on baptism with its practical consequence of total consecration to the Eternal and Incarnate Wisdom becomes the root characteristic of his vision of reality.

Moreover, his stay at the village of Montfort was extremely brief. He lived there no more than the first two years of his short lifespan of just over forty-three years. His youth was spent at the family’s farmhouse, “Bois-Marquer,” in the town of Iffendic, a few miles from his birthplace. The second of eighteen children, Louis was one of the few who survived to adulthood. His father, a notary, was known for his fiery temper, his mother, for her deep piety. The Grignion family owned some property, but were not considered well-off, nor part of the upper-class. Louis was born into a family of deep Catholic faith. Born in an area of France renowned for its strong Christian life.

Starts Jesuit College . . .

Montfort goes to Jesuit College At the age of eleven. Louis-Marie set out for Rennes, the capital of Brittany, to enroll in the Jesuit College of Saint Thomas å Becket. The institution enjoyed an excellent reputation and therefore had about two thousand young men attending its classes. It was here that Montfort formed lasting friendships, particularly with two fellow students.  Claude Poullart des Places, the first founder of the Holy Ghost Fathers, and especially with John Baptist Blain who also became the intimate friend of Saint John Baptist de la Salle, the founder of the Christian Brothers. Louis-Marie’s uncle, a priest at the Church of Saint Saviour in Rennes, was the youth’s close confidant. His family moved into the city after Louis’ first two years at the College. Returning to the countryside home in Iffendic during the summers.

. . . At Age Eleven

The young student from Montfort was considered by his teachers to be intelligent, and studious. Montfort was deeply religious, artistic in nature, and somewhat shy. The Jesuits became his life-long friends. Their residences would always be his refuge in trying times, a place for rest and retreat. Under the guidance of his Jesuit teachers, Louis’ priestly vocation matured. The decision to go on to the priesthood was made “at the feet of Our Lady,” in the Carmelite church in Rennes. There is little doubt that Montfort’s love for Mary was nurtured by his Jesuit directors, especially those in charge of the Sodality of Our Lady at the College.

After eight years at the Jesuit College of Rennes, thanks to unexpected financial help, Louis Marie decided to pursue his priestly studies at Saint-Sulpice in Paris. At the age of nineteen, then, a new chapter opens in his life. The young man bade good-bye to family and friends at the bridge of Cesson on the outskirts of the city of Rennes.  The event takes on great symbolism. Having left all, he crossed the Cesson bridge to a new life of total dependence on Divine Providence. So convinced was he that God is truly his loving Father, that he gave to the first beggars he met, his money, baggage and even exchanged clothes with one of them.

With a joyful total abandon. He gave free expression to his deep desire to experience the radical demands Of the Gospel. Begging for food and shelter along the way, he walked to Paris, arriving in the rags of a mendicant. He was beginning to find his freedom in a total surrender to God’s Love, the Incarnate and Eternal Wisdom, Jesus the Lord.

Associates . . .

At Paris, he lodged with communities of poor ecclesiastics who were connected with the seminary of Saint Sulpice. For the first two years he attended classes at the Sorbonne. However, the following six years of study were spent under the tutelage of the Sulpician Fathers themselves. Like the Jesuits, they found the student from the village of Montfort very talented. He is a man of deep faith, intensely studious, and strongly devoted to Our Lady. His weakness: a practical love for the poor, a desire to serve the outcasts of Paris society, a determination to live the Gospel even though he be considered an oddity – although perhaps a saintly one!

Montfort was an avid reader and thoroughly enjoyed his work as librarian at Saint Sulpice. He not only studied the traditional texts for seminarians of his time (Commentaries on Thomas Aquinas, Cornelius a Lapide, etc.) but knew well the spiritual works of Bernard, Olier, Vincent de Paul, Boudon, Poire, Condren, de Berulle, Francis de Sales, John Eudes, d’Argentan, Crasset, Vincent Ferrer, Alan de la Roche, and many others. Through many of these authors he came into contact with writings of the Fathers of the Church.

. . . With the Poor

Above all, he was a man of the Bible. Texts of Scripture, usually interpreted in a spiritual sense, abound in his preaching and writings. His goal was also becoming more precise: to be a missionary either in France or abroad. He yearned to proclaim the Good News to the poor. To proclaim to the outcasts, to tell them of the love of Jesus and of the maternal care of Mary. At the altar of Our Lady in the parish church of Saint Sulpice, Father Louis-Marie Grignion celebrated his first Mass, June 5, 1700. From the age of eleven, he had completed sixteen years of formal study for this day.

Montfort’s priestly ministry itself lasted only sixteen years. After a few years with various mission bands preaching parish renewals and ministering to the destitute at the “hospital” of Poitiers (where he began the foundation of the Congregation of the Daughters of Wisdom) and also serving the sick poor at the General Hospital in Paris, Father Louis-Marie was still unsettled. He decided, simply, to seek the advice of the Pope.

Seeks Rome’s Approval

He set out on foot from Western France. He walked to the Holy City begging for food and shelter along the way. At the sight of Rome, he took off his sandals and continued barefoot to the tomb of Peter. In June 1706, Montfort knelt before Clement XI, pouring out his heart to the Vicar of Christ. Strangely, the Pope clearly saw in this priest extraordinary gifts of God. He turned down Louis-Marie’s offer to go to the mission of Canada or of the Far East. Rather, he named him “Apostolic Missionary”. The pope told him to return to his native land and continue preaching the renewal of the vows of baptism. For Montfort, it was the seal of approval on his vocation. And also, on the content and method of his preaching the Word of God.

Returning on foot to Poitiers, he spent the rest of his life conducting approximately two hundred missions and retreats throughout Western France, proclaiming the Gospel with Spirit-filled power. Now, three hundred years later, many of the parishes where Father de Montfort preached still hold his visit to their town as a turning point in the faith of the area. His bold, innovative, charismatic proclamation of God’s love, in churches, monasteries, barracks, poorhouses, town squares and even in houses of prostitution, was a source of admiration for many, of anger for others. Montfort’s life-style – a poor, vagabond preacher, his few possessions (Bible, breviary, notebooks) in a knapsack strung across his shoulder – 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.

Lover . . .

With utter disdain for human respect, Saint Louis-Marie identified with the poor and found his greatest joy in serving them with the Word of God. Serving them with any material help he could locate. Typical of his actions was the recorded event – probably one of many similar acts on his part – when the saint tenderly embraced a dying leprous beggar lying in the streets of Dinan, carried him to a nearby religious house and cried out to the doorkeeper. “Open up to Jesus Christ.” The poor even took up a collection to purchase some warm clothing for this priest whom they proudly called “one of their own.”

To the majority of the people, Louis Grignion was “the good Father from Montfort” (le bon Pere de Montfort) or “the Father with the big rosary“. (Saint Louis Marie had a large rosary attached to the belt of his cassock). But for some, he was the enemy. His preaching, flowing from his own experience of God’s love and Mary’s maternal care, attracted thousands back to the faith.

. . . of the Poor

In a jansenistic age, he recommended even daily communion, a tender devotion to the Mother of God, a lived-out total surrender of all that we are to Jesus through Mary. Because of the style and contents of his preaching, this Elijah-like prophet was regarded by quite a few as at least a strange misfit. He was poisoned and although it did not prove fatal, it caused his health to deteriorate even more rapidly. Other attempts were also made on his life. Yet Montfort was not deterred. The Jesuits, the Dominicans, (whose Third Order he joined in 1710), the Sulpicians, would be his support.

He deeply experienced that his entire life was in the loving hands of Jesus. Or as he would put it, that he was the loving slave of Jesus in Mary. He had so deepened his life in Christ that he had now no desire to be a “success,” no yearning for any mystical experiences, no drive for renown. His only desire was to be the lute the Eternal Wisdom would play, producing whatever melody the Spirit wishes. In this active, responsible, lived-out consecration to the Eternal Wisdom through Mary, he found peace, and the power to share the Gospel with all whom he encountered.

(See Part II in a Future Publication)