Today August 30

Today is the feast of St. Jeanne Jugan (1792-1879), founder of the Little Sisters of the Poor, committed to caring for the elderly. "We must spoil them all we can," she famously said. (original emphasis) Good. We are all aging and it's sure nice to see someone devoted to helping US as we grow old instead of the cute little moppets everyone wants to help!

She was a very proud person, though born poor, of a poor fisherman and one of eight children. Her father died when she was young and her family struggled. Even though they were outlawed, the Third Order of the Heart of the Admirable Mother sisters taught them their catechism, as well as the other children in Brittany. She became a servant later and luckily had good employers who visited and helped the poor. Although she was encouraged to continue in service (even to the point of being promised a higher salary and fewer hours), she felt called to help the poor and old full-time. She never meant to found an order. She just went around begging for the poor and sick, especially widows -- even though they were often drunkards. She even gave up her own bed for one of them, Anne Chauvin. Jeanne attracted other young women -- well, not so young; she WAS 45, after all -- to herself, perhaps naturally, because she was kind and joyful. She slogged it out day by day and eventually took over an old Daughters of the Cross convent that had been abandoned and kind of had to come up with a rule and an order. She modeled it on the very active Third Order of the Heart of the Admirable Mother (or Eudist Sisters), but was kind of on her own. The sisters slept on the floor and were as poor as some of the old folks they cared for. They took them in -- without pay -- fed the, nursed them, visited them (those who had homes) and indeed, spoiled them. God blessed her order: there were 36 houses, 2400 Little Sisters and 4000 old people by the time of her death in 1879. She was 87 and in poor health -- nearly blind as well. She longed for death, but not because she was scared or in pain, but because she wanted "to go and see God." She died on this date in 1879. She'd lived a quiet life, having been replaced as superior early on (by a young and controllable woman, on the orders of the domineering parish priest) and never drew attention to herself later in life. Her last words were: "O Mary, my dear Mother, come to me. You know I love you and how I long to see you."