Mary Euphrasia Pelletier
Mary of the Holy Mary Euphrasia Euphrasia Pelletier also, real name Rose- Virginie Pelletier ( born July 31, 1796 Noirmoutier, † April 24, 1868 in Angers) was a French nun, founder and Superior General of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd. She is worshiped by the Roman Catholic Church as a saint.
Life and work
Rose- Virginie Pelletier was born as the eighth child of Anna and Julien Pelletier on the Atlantic island of Noirmoutier. In 1805 the father died, five years later moved with his family to the mother Soullans. Rose- Virginie attended a finishing school in Tours. The strict Pensionatsregeln and the death of his mother in 1813 aroused in Rose - Virginie the desire to join a monastery and they got in touch with the going back to St. John Eudes Sisters of Our Lady of Charity, whose mother house was right next to the boarding house. She joined the Order on October 20, 1814, took the habit on September 6, 1815 and received the name Sister Mary of the Holy Euphrasia. The perpetual vows she put after reaching the age of majority from in 1817. She took in the Order, especially the troubled young women and former prostitutes took to work as a governess to. 1825 The 29 -year-old Mary Euphrasia was elected by the Convention on the successor to the Superior Hippolytus, although she had not reached the necessary according to the rules of order the age of 40 years and required a papal dispensation to perform the duties. She founded the same year the Society of Mary Magdalene, were added to the penitent women, and they board in 1831.
1828 was the bishop of Angers a bequest over 30,000 francs, with the refuge should be established for women in distress. He entrusted the task to Mary Euphrasia, who traveled in 1829 to Angers and in a former Kattunfabrik the monastery of the Good Shepherd einrichtete and on July 31, 1829 handed over his destiny. Following the establishment of the Superior Paul Bodin Mary Euphrasia returned to Tours. Sister Paul Bodin was the task of the further construction of the monastery but not grown and Mary Euphrasia was recalled to Angers. In order to more effectively manage and work of the Order she founded a Generalate with mother's house in Angers, which all other offices should be subject. Thus, the de facto community was re-established and received on 16 February 1835, the papal approbation under the direction of confirmed as Superior General Mary Euphrasia. Until her death in 110 new branches were established worldwide, the first German settlement was established in 1840 in Munich.
Mary Euphrasia was beatified in 1933, their canonization by Pope Pius XII. place on 2 May 1940. feast day is your June 24.