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Saint Jeanne Jugan - Foundress

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               Jeanne Jugan, also known as Sister Mary of the Cross, was a French woman who became known for the dedication of her life to the neediest of the elderly poor. Her service resulted in the establishment of the Little Sisters of the Poor, who care for the elderly who have no other resources throughout the world. She has been declared a saint by the Catholic Church.

EARLY LIFE

                          

            Jeanne was born on October 25th, 1792 in Cancale, a fishing port in Brittany, France in the midst of the French Revolution at Cancale, Brittany. Her father worked aboard a New Foundland-bound fishing vessel, like many of his countrymen. In 1796, he was lost at sea. Jeanne and her three siblings soon knew poverty and work. She took on different jobs, including that of kitchen-maid in a manor near Cancale, nurse in hospital at Saint Servan and domestic nurse..

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To the marriage proposal of a young sailor, she answered, "God wants me for Himself. He is keeping me for a workwhich is not yet known, for a work which is not yet founded."

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INCEPTION OF LITTLE SISTERS OF THE POOR 

               One winter evening in 1839, in Saint Servan, France, she opened her heart and home to an elderly blind, paralyzed woman who suddenly found herself alone after the death of her sister. Jeanne carried Anne Chauvin through the streets of the small town, brought her to her apartment and placed her in her bed. Another woman followed and then, a third. The Congregation of the Little Sisters of the Poor, with its mission of hospitality to the elderly, was born.

INITIAL STAGES              

              Because of the great poverty in France in the years following the French Revolution, Jeanne’s bold gesture of charity toward the aged answered a pressing need. Her small apartment soon became too small to accommodate the growing number of elderly who knocked at her door seeking hospitality. Several young women came to assist Jeanne in the care of the Aged and the group moved from one building to another until they could obtain a suitable home.

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EXPANSION

        Jeanne envisioned hospitality to the elderly as a humble fraternal service which unites in one family the Little Sisters and lay associates, friends, benefactors and volunteers, who desire to share the sufferings of their brothers and sisters and provide generously for their needs. 

      After communities of Little Sisters had begun to spread throughout France, the work spread to England in 1851. From 1866-1871 five communities of Little Sisters were founded across the United States.

APPROVAL OF CONSTITUTION

      By 1879, the community Jeanne founded had 2400 Little Sisters and had spread across Europe and to North America. That year Pope Leo XIII approved the Constitutions of the Little Sisters of the Poor. At the time of her death on August 29, 1879, many of the Little Sisters did not know that she was the one to have founded the Congregation. For 27 years Jeanne was put aside by Father Le Pailleur who helped the nascent Congregation, however was investigated and dismissed in 1890 and Jeanne came to be acknowledged as their foundress.

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      On 13th July 1979, the Church recognised the heroicity of Jeanne Jugan's virtues. On 3rd October 1982, Pope John Paul II proclaimed her Blessed and on 11th October 2009 on St Peter's Square in Rome, Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed Jeanne Jugan to be a Saint!

POPE BENEDICT XVI

POPE BENEDICT XVI

Said during his homily at the Canonization ceremony in Rome:

“Jeanne lived the mystery of love by peacefully accepting darkness and divesting herself of all material possessions until her death. Her charism is always relevant, while so many aged persons suffer different types of poverty and solitude, sometimes even abandoned by their families. The spirit of hospitality and fraternal love, founded on limitless trust in Providence, which Jeanne Jugan drew from the Beatitudes, illuminated her whole existence. The evangelical impulse is followed today throughout the world in the Congregation of the Little Sisters of the Poor, which she founded and which bears witness to her following the mercy of God and the compassionate love of the Heart of Jesus for the littlest ones. May Saint Jeanne Jugan be for the elderly a living source of hope and for the persons so generously placing themselves at their service a powerful stimulus to pursue and develop her work!”

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