St Francis de Sales

Francis de Sales began as a gifted young Savoyard nobleman, richly educated and capable of a very different career, yet his life soon turned through the inward trials that formed him. His temptation against hope in youth, his priestly vocation, and his mission into the Chablais all help explain the gentleness for which he later became famous. In the Chablais he preached in dangerous conditions, wrote and distributed tracts when people would not hear him openly, and slowly won back territory by patience rather than violence. As bishop of Geneva, living at Annecy, he preached constantly, taught the catechism, heard confessions, guided consciences, and governed with a firmness so mild that inattentive people could mistake it for softness.

It was not softness. He was exact in doctrine, practical in administration, and quietly heroic in labor. His friendship with St Jane Frances de Chantal and the founding of the Visitation widen the life still further, and his death has the feel of a man worn out by charity. What makes him unforgettable is how much strength lives inside his gentleness.