Today the Church celebrates the liturgical memorial of Saint Vincent de Paul, a 17th-century French priest who went down in history as the great apostle of charity and charitable organization. Born to a family of humble farmers, Vincent deeply understood that love for God cannot be separated from concrete service to the least, the poor, and the suffering. His profound intuition led him to found the Congregation of the Mission, whose members are known as Lazarists, dedicated to the evangelization of peasants and the training of clergy in seminaries. But his revolutionary work did not stop there: together with Saint Louise de Marillac, he gave life to the Daughters of Charity, the famous Vincentians, who were the first sisters ‘free’ to leave the convents to work directly in the streets, in hospitals, and alongside the needy. Appointed universal patron of charitable works by Pope Leo XIII, Saint Vincent de Paul continues to be a shining beacon and an unsurpassed model of faith lived through closeness and solidarity.
