Holy Humanity: The Legacy of Louise de Marillac

On the 350th anniversary of the deaths of Louise de Marillac and St Vincent de Paul, this work marks their collaboration and celebrates Louise's legacy as co-founder of the Daughters of Charity.

This book traces Louise's life, the development of her spirituality and her passionate concern and work for the poor. All this is placed in the social and religious upheaval of her day, seventeenth century France.

The book highlights Louise's humble mysticism, her sense of the holiness of humanity in Jesus Christ, her loving care for the abandoned ones of her time, and her role as a pioneer of social services. She was an untiring administrator and an inspired leader. Louise not only challenged and shaped structures inside the Catholic Church, but also contributed to the ethos and organisation of civil society. Her legacy reaches into our own times.
Though Louise's times were very different from ours, the pressing political and religious questions remain the same: Should the state be responsible for welfare? Should hospitals be the responsibility of local boards or the central government? Should politicians act from principle or from pragmatism? Should the reformed church be a place only for the virtuous or should it also include the sinner?

Following the suppression of the order after the French Revolution and its reinstatement in 1800, a new significant figure, Rosalie Rendu, entered the Sisters of Charity. In the tradition of Louise, she expanded the order's works for the poor, and led Federick Ozanam to begin the Society of St Vincent de Paul.

For the followers of Louise and Rosalie and Frederic today - and for all who follow Jesus Christ in caring for the sick poor in society - the same challenges remain: to see the needs of the poor, to see the presence of God with the eyes of a mystic, and to work with the imagination of an entrepreneur, the skills of a manager and the heart of a saint.