Vincent was a peasant and a highly intelligent youth. He spent four years with Franciscan friars at Acqs getting an education. He was the tutor to children of a gentlemen of the town. He began divinity studies in 1596 at the University of Toulouse and became a priest at age 20. Vincent was taken captive by Turkish pirates to Tunis, and sold into slavery. He was freed in 1607 when he converted one of his owners to Christianity.
Vincent served as parish priest near Paris where he started organizations to help the poor, nurse the sick, find jobs for the unemployed, etc. He was the chaplain at the court of Henry IV of France. With Louise de Marillac, he founded the Congregation of the Daughters of Charity. He instituted the Congregation of Priests of the Mission (Lazarists). Vincent worked always for the poor, the enslaved, the abandoned, the ignored, the pariahs.
Born: 1581 near Ranquine, Gascony near Dax, southwest France; now known as Saint-Vincent-de-Paul, Landes
Died: 1660 at Paris; body incorrupt
Canonized: 1737 by Pope Clement XII
Readings:
However great the work that God may achieve by an individual, he must not indulge in self-satisfaction. He ought rather to be all the more humbled, seeing himself merely as a tool which God has made use of.
"Saint Vincent de Paul
We must love our neighbor as being made in the image of God and as an object of His love.
"Saint Vincent de Paul
The Church teaches us that mercy belongs to God. Let us implore Him to bestow on us the spirit of mercy and compassion, so that we are filled with it and may never lose it. Only consider how much we ourselves are in need of mercy.
"Saint Vincent de Paul