1. John Eudes, CIM was a French Catholic priest and the founder of both the Order of Our Lady of Charity in 1641 and Congregation of Jesus and Mary, known as the Eudists, in 1643.
22 Facts About John Eudes
1. 2.
John Eudes was a professed member of the Oratory of Jesus until 1643.
3.
John Eudes was an ardent proponent of the two devotions and dedicated himself to their promotion and celebration.
4.
John Eudes preached missions across France, including Paris and Versailles, while earning recognition as a popular evangelist and confessor.
5.
John Eudes was a prolific writer and wrote on the Sacred Hearts despite opposition from the Jansenists.
6.
John Eudes was canonized in 1925 and his supporters are now petitioning to have him named a Doctor of the Church.
7.
John Eudes was sent to Aubervilliers for his theological studies and returned to Seez in 1627.
8.
John Eudes did this with the permission of his Oratorian superiors.
9.
John Eudes even preached once for Anne of Austria, though her son King Louis XIV suspected that John Eudes was hostile towards his Gallican policies.
10.
John Eudes was quite concerned about the spiritual improvement of priests and realized that the seminaries needed improvement.
11.
John Eudes founded several seminaries in the region including in Rennes.
12.
John Eudes founded the Society of the Most Admirable Mother which acted as a sort of Third Order, and would later count among its members Jeanne Jugan and Amelie Fristel.
13.
John Eudes was influenced by the teachings of the French school, Francis de Sales, and the revelations of Gertrude the Great and Mechtilde.
14.
John Eudes changed the somewhat individual and private character of the devotion into a devotion for the whole church when he wrote for the benefit of his communities an Office and a Mass which later received approval from several bishops before spreading throughout the church.
15.
John Eudes dedicated the chapels of the Caen and Coutances seminaries to the Sacred Heart.
16.
John Eudes composed various rosaries and prayers dedicated to the Sacred Hearts.
17.
In 1671 there was a rumor that John Eudes would be named as the Coadjutor Bishop of Evreux and that the king Louis XIV would support the nomination based on John Eudes' reputation.
18.
John Eudes' remains were exhumed and transferred in 1810 and again for the last time on 6 March 1884.
19.
John Eudes taught about the mystical unity of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary and wrote:.
20.
Pope Leo XIII later confirmed, on 6 January 1903, that John Eudes had lived a life of heroic virtue and thus named him as Venerable.
21.
The pope went on to describe John Eudes' "apostolic zeal" in the formation of seminarians into priests as well as the fact that John Eudes was a model for evangelization and witness to the "love for Christ's Heart and Mary's Heart".
22.
Saint Peter's Basilica features a statue portraying John Eudes constructed by Silvio Silva in 1932.