St. Julie Billiart

St. Julie Billiart was born on 12 July 1751 at Cuvilly in Picardy, France, of a farming family, and was from childhood remarkable for piety and a love of teaching the faith to others. In her twenties a shock, following an attempt on her father's life, brought on a mysterious paralysis that left her an invalid for some twenty-two years, much of it unable to move or speak, yet she bore this long trial with heroic patience and continued to draw souls to God from her sickbed.

During the persecution of the French Revolution she was hunted for sheltering priests and had to be hidden and moved from place to place. With the noblewoman St. Françoise Blin de Bourdon she founded in 1804 the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, dedicated to the Christian education of poor girls and the training of teachers. That same year, at a mission, she was suddenly and completely cured of her paralysis after long years, and for the rest of her life she traveled tirelessly to spread her congregation across France and Belgium. She died at Namur on 8 April 1816 and was canonized in 1969.