Jane Frances de Chantal

Who they were

Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot was born at Dijon on 23 January 1572 to a noble family; her mother died when she was eighteen months old and her father, a magistrate, raised her with a strong sense of justice. In 1592 she married Baron Christophe de Rabutin-Chantal and had six children, four of whom survived; she restored the family estate at Bourbilly and never turned away the poor at the castle door.

Widowed in 1601 by a hunting accident, she spent seven years of humiliation in the house of her father-in-law, refused every suitor, and branded the name of Jesus on her breast. In 1604 she met St Francis de Sales, who became her director, and in 1610 they founded the Visitation at Annecy. She died in 1641.

The miracles

The miracles examined for her causes are not described in the sources we have used.

Why that counted as sanctity

Wife, mother, widow and foundress, Jane Frances wanted nothing less than God - 'the heart that God does not satisfy is too greedy' - and abandoned herself entirely to His Providence.

Connected on this site

• Francis de Sales Saint
  “With St Jane Frances de Chantal he founded the Visitation of Holy Mary in 1610.” — this site's research