Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622)

A religious frontier in the heart of Europe

Francis de Sales was born into a world cut in two by the Protestant Reformation. Since 1535, Geneva — which had until then been the seat of the bishopric whose title he would bear — had become the "Rome of Calvinism", the city of John Calvin and his successor Theodore Beza. The bishops of Geneva, driven out, had taken refuge at Annecy, in Savoy, which remained Catholic.^[7][8] The whole country of Francis de Sales thus lived on a fault line: on one side the Duchy of Savoy, faithful to Rome; on the other, the Genevan Republic, a powerful centre for spreading the Reformed faith in French-speaking lands.

This situation explains the paradox of his whole life: Francis de Sales would be bishop of a city in which he could never reside, and his ministry would be marked from beginning to end by the encounter — peaceful but firm — with Protestantism.

The house of Sales

The Sales belonged to the old Savoyard nobility. Francis was born on 21 August 1567 at the Château de Sales, near Thorens, the eldest son of François de Sales, lord of Boisy, and Françoise de Sionnaz, a pious mother who deeply marked his upbringing.^[9][10] His father first destined him for a brilliant career as a magistrate, as was customary in great families: law, honours, an advantageous marriage. The whole of Francis's youth would be crossed by the tension between the father's plan — succeeding in the world — and the inner call drawing him toward God.

The child of Thorens and the college of Annecy

Francis received his first schooling at the Collège Chappuisien in Annecy, where he very early showed a serious piety and the desire to consecrate himself to God.^[11] From childhood, two traits set him apart: a remarkable intelligence and a gentleness of character that would never leave him — to the point that he would have to struggle, all his life, against a naturally choleric temperament which he managed to master until he became the very model of meekness.

Clermont, Paris and the temptation of despair

At eleven, Francis was sent to Paris, to the prestigious Collège de Clermont run by the Jesuits, where he studied letters, philosophy and theology from 1578 to 1588.^[12][13] It was there that the founding trial of his spiritual life occurred. Around 1586-1587, the young man went through a terrible interior crisis: tormented by the debates on predestination, he convinced himself that he was damned, condemned in advance to be separated from God for eternity. For several weeks, he sank into a physical and moral distress that consumed him.^[14][15]

Deliverance came through an act of pure abandonment. Entering the church of Saint-Étienne-des-Grès, before a statue of the Virgin, he recited the Memorare and made God a heroic offering: even if he were to be deprived forever of the beatific vision, he would at least love Him during this life. The moment he accepted to love God freely, without condition, peace was restored to him. This experience — loving God for Himself and not for the reward — would become the keystone of his entire spiritual doctrine.

Padua: the doctorate in utroque jure

In 1588, his father sent him to complete his education at the famous University of Padua, in Italy. There Francis studied civil and canon law while secretly following courses in theology, under the direction of a Jesuit, Father Antonio Possevino.^[16][17] In 1591, he obtained there the doctorate in utroque jure — in both laws — crowning brilliant studies. In the eyes of the world, the young Savoyard now had everything needed to succeed: birth, titles, learning.

Refusing the magistracy and the priestly vocation

Back in Savoy, Francis faced the great choice of his life. His father had obtained for him an office as senator in the Senate of Savoy and was preparing a marriage for him. But the young man had already decided in his heart: he wanted to be a priest. After long paternal resistance, overcome notably thanks to the intervention of the Bishop of Geneva Claude de Granier — who offered him the provostship of the chapter of Geneva, the foremost dignity of the diocese — his father yielded.^[18][19]

Francis was ordained priest on 18 December 1593 at Annecy. He was twenty-six. Renouncing the honours of the world, he deliberately chose the humblest and riskiest service there was: the spiritual reconquest of lands lost to the Catholic faith.

A province gone over to Calvinism

The Chablais, a region south of Lake Geneva, had been occupied by the Bernese and massively converted to Calvinism. Restored to the Catholic Duke Charles Emmanuel I of Savoy, it now had to be brought back to the faith. The task was considered impossible: out of tens of thousands of inhabitants, only a handful of Catholics could still be counted, and the first missionaries had failed. In September 1594, Francis de Sales volunteered, accompanied by his cousin Louis de Sales.^[20][21]

The beginnings were extremely harsh. Doors closed, sermons were preached to empty pews, the missionary was threatened and attempts were made on his life; he narrowly escaped wolves and the cold, slept in barns, crossed frozen rivers. But he persevered.

The method of gentleness and the "placards"

Seeing that the pulpit was not enough, Francis invented a new weapon. He wrote short leaflets explaining the faith — tracts, later called his Controversies — and had them slipped under doors, posted up, copied and distributed.^[22][23] This preaching through print, at a time when the printed word was becoming a power, is one of the reasons why the Church would, three centuries later, make him the patron of journalists.

But his true method ran deeper: he refused constraint and staked everything on patience, friendship, concrete charity, peaceful argument. Where others wanted to impose, he proposed and loved. It is from this period that his pastoral motto dates:

"Nothing by force, all by love." — spiritual motto of Saint Francis de Sales^[24]

The Controversies and the return of a people

Patiently, conversions began, then multiplied. Francis disputed publicly with the ministers, visited families, instructed children, cared for the poor. According to tradition, he even met at Geneva the aged Theodore Beza, Calvin's heir, in conversations marked by mutual respect.^[25] By the end of the mission, around 1598, the Chablais had massively returned to Catholicism — a resounding success attributed not to arms, but to the holiness and gentleness of a single man. His pamphlets of controversy, gathered later, constitute a monument of serene apologetics, in which doctrinal firmness is never separated from charity.^[26]

The journey to Paris and the consecration (1602)

Envisaged as coadjutor to the Bishop of Geneva, Francis was sent in 1602 on a mission to Paris, to the court of Henry IV, where his words and holiness made a vivid impression; the king, it is said, wanted to keep him in France.^[27] On the death of Claude de Granier, Francis was consecrated Bishop of Geneva on 8 December 1602, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception. He was thirty-five, and would govern, from Annecy, a difficult, extensive and poor diocese until his death.

A Tridentine reforming pastor

As bishop, Francis zealously applied the reform willed by the Council of Trent, alongside his great contemporaries Saint Charles Borromeo at Milan and Saint Philip Neri at Rome. He tirelessly visited his parishes, even the most remote in the mountains; he himself catechized the children; he reformed the clergy, founded schools, preached without respite.^[28][29] His theological learning, gentleness and accessibility made him a bishop adored by his people.

The most sought-after director of souls of his time

It was above all as a spiritual director that Francis de Sales acquired an immense influence, far beyond the borders of his diocese. From Paris, from all over France, letters were written to him; bundles of letters flowed into Annecy, and the bishop answered them with tenderness and psychological finesse without equal. His correspondence — several thousand letters — is, in the judgement of his biographers, "the fullest and most faithful history of his life in existence."^[30]

This genius for direction rested on one conviction: each person's path must be adapted to his state, his strengths, his temperament. Never a rigid method, never constraint. He healed scrupulous souls, encouraged the lukewarm, moderated the ardent — always through gentleness.

The meeting at Dijon (1604)

In Lent 1604, preaching at Dijon, Francis met a young widowed mother, deeply tried and hungry for holiness: Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot, Baronne de Chantal — the future Saint Jane Frances de Chantal.^[31][32] From this meeting was born one of the most beautiful spiritual friendships in the history of the Church. Francis became her director; together, they matured over years an entirely new plan of religious life.

A new form of religious life

Francis's plan was bold. The women's orders of his time imposed a rigorous enclosure and great bodily austerities, closed to widows, to women of fragile health or delicate constitution. Francis wanted a congregation in which perfection would rest not on exterior mortifications but on humility, gentleness and the love of God — a congregation open to souls whom the old orders rejected.^[33] The sisters were even, originally, to visit and nurse the sick in their homes, hence the name of the Visitation, in memory of Mary's visit to Saint Elizabeth.

The Visitation of Holy Mary (1610)

The Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary was founded at Annecy on 6 June 1610, with Jane de Chantal and her first companions.^[34][35] Faced with the era's resistance to the idea of unenclosed nuns, the institute would be transformed into a contemplative enclosed order, but it would keep the Salesian imprint: gentleness, hidden life, love. The Visitation would spread rapidly; it is within it that, later, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque would receive the revelations of the Sacred Heart. Francis would give his daughters a treasure of spiritual direction, the Conferences and many letters. At the founder's death in 1622, the order already counted thirteen houses; there were eighty-six at the death of Jane de Chantal at Moulins in 1641, and one hundred and sixty-four at her canonization.^[36] Beatified in 1751 then canonized in 1767, Jane rests beside Francis in the church of the Visitation at Annecy.^[37]

The Introduction to the Devout Life (1609)

In 1609 appeared the book that would make Francis de Sales universally famous: the Introduction to the Devout Life, addressed to a fictitious reader named Philothea ("she who loves God").^[38][39] Drawn from letters of direction written to a kinswoman, this short treatise was at once an immense success, translated throughout Europe — one of the first spiritual "best-sellers" of the modern age. Its genius: teaching holiness not to monks, but to people of the world, in a clear language, full of imagery, common sense and tenderness.

Francis first gives a luminous definition of true devotion, which is not a matter of exterior practices but of love:

"Devotion is the true spiritual sugar which removes bitterness from mortifications [...] it serves as fire in winter and as dew in summer." — Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, I, 2^[40]

"An error, nay a heresy": holiness for every state of life

The revolutionary heart of the book is the affirmation that devotion suits every condition. Against the idea, widespread in his time, that only religious could aim at perfection, Francis proclaims that God calls everyone to holiness, where they are:

"It is an error, nay a heresy, to wish to banish the devout life from the company of soldiers, the mechanic's workshop, the prince's court, the married household." — Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, I, 3^[41]

He then spins a famous image: the bee draws its honey from flowers without harming them; likewise true devotion spoils no state of life, it adorns and beautifies it — marriage becomes gentler, work more peaceful, the prince's service more faithful.^[42] This idea — holiness in the heart of the world — is undoubtedly Francis de Sales's most lasting contribution, and it runs through four centuries down to the contemporary Church's teaching on the universal call to holiness.

The Treatise on the Love of God (1616)

Seven years later, in 1616, Francis published his theological masterpiece: the Treatise on the Love of God, addressed this time to Theotimus. A work of full maturity, the fruit of his experience as bishop and director, it is a complete mystical theology retracing the history of love between God and the soul, from its first awakenings to the highest union.^[43][44] Where the Introduction addressed beginners, the Treatise leads advanced souls to the summit of charity.

The work opens with a definition of striking density, placing love at the pinnacle of all creation:

"Man is the perfection of the universe, the spirit is the perfection of man, love that of the spirit, and charity that of love. That is why the love of God is the end, the perfection and the excellence of the universe." — Saint Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God, X, 1^[45]

It is this book, more than any other, that earned Francis de Sales the noble title of "Doctor of the love of God". With Saint John of the Cross and Saint Teresa of Avila, he belongs to the great generation of spiritual masters that the Catholic Reformation gave to the Church.

Gentleness: "nothing by force, all by love"

All Salesian spirituality rests on gentleness. For Francis, God is won and served not by violence — even pious violence — but by patience and love. This gentleness is not softness: it is a mastered strength, the fruit of a struggle against his own impetuous temperament. He first teaches gentleness toward oneself: not being discouraged by one's falls, rising again peacefully, refusing the turmoil of scruples.

That is the constant spirit of his direction: rising from each fall with gentleness, without discouragement or irritation against oneself — the gentleness toward ourselves to which he devotes chapter IX of the third part of the Introduction to the Devout Life.^[46]

This pedagogy of meekness made him the most approachable and most beloved saint of Catholic spirituality — a doctor whose deepest teaching can be summed up in a smile.

Death at Lyon (1622)

Worn out by years of apostolic labour, Francis died at Lyon on 28 December 1622, aged fifty-five, as he was returning from a journey on which he had accompanied the court of Savoy.^[47][48] According to tradition, his last whispered words were inspired by Scripture and by his habitual abandonment to God's will. His body was brought back to Annecy, where it rests, and where his memory remains inseparable from that of Saint Jane de Chantal.

Beatification (1661) and canonization (1665)

Francis's reputation for holiness was immediate and universal. He was beatified in 1661, then canonized on 19 April 1665 by Pope Alexander VII, during a solemn ceremony in Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome.^[49][50] His feast was inscribed in the Roman calendar; it is celebrated today on 24 January.

Doctor of the Church (1877)

In 1877, Pope Pius IX proclaimed Francis de Sales Doctor of the Church — supreme recognition of the authority and fruitfulness of his spiritual doctrine.^[51][52] He thus joined the small number of saints whose writings carry authority for the whole Church. His traditional title, Doctor caritatis — "Doctor of charity" or of love — says well enough what the Church retains of him: having taught, better than any other in his time, the path of the love of God offered to all.

Patron of journalists and writers (1923)

For the third centenary of his death, Pope Pius XI devoted to Francis de Sales the encyclical Rerum Omnium Perturbationem (26 January 1923) and proclaimed him patron of journalists and Catholic writers.^[53] The choice is profoundly fitting: Francis was one of the first great saints to grasp the power of the printed word for the faith, from the leaflets slipped under the doors of the Chablais to his books spread throughout Europe. In the age of the media, the Church made the Bishop of Annecy the model for all who proclaim the truth with the pen — with his own mark: clarity, charity and gentleness.

The legacy: Salesian spirituality

The influence of Francis de Sales was incalculable. He directly formed Saint Jane de Chantal and the Order of the Visitation; he marked Saint Vincent de Paul, who was for a time superior of the Visitandines of Paris; his doctrine of gentleness and holiness for all watered all of modern spirituality. In the 19th century, Saint John Bosco placed his educational work under his patronage: founded at Turin in 1859, his congregation is officially called the "Society of Saint Francis de Sales" — the Salesians.^[54] From the humble missionary of the Chablais to the universal Doctor of the Church, Francis de Sales remains the saint who proved that one can obtain everything through love, and nothing through force — and that the highest holiness can smile.

• Saint Jane Frances de Chantal (1572-1641) — his spiritual daughter and co-foundress of the Visitation, one of the most beautiful holy friendships in history.
• The Council of Trent (1545-1563) — the reform of which he was, as bishop, an exemplary implementer.
• The Catholic Reformation — the great movement of regeneration of which he is a major figure.
• The Protestant Reformation — the Genevan Calvinism to which he answered with gentleness in the Chablais.
• Saint Charles Borromeo (1538-1584) — the other great reforming bishop of his generation.
• Saint John of the Cross (1542-1591) and Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) — the mystical masters of the same era.
• Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque (1647-1690) — the Visitandine to whom the Sacred Heart revealed Himself, in the order founded by Francis de Sales.