Venerable Jean-Marie de La Mennais

Jean-Marie Robert de La Mennais, FICP (or de Lamennais; 1780–1860) was a Breton Catholic priest and brother of the philosopher Felicité Robert de Lamennais, whom he influenced in their youth. He was a leading figure in the revival of the Catholic Church in France after the French Revolution, involved in founding three religious institutes as part of this effort. Pope Paul VI proclaimed him to be Venerable in 1966 and his cause of canonization is ongoing. Jean-Marie was born at Saint-Malo, then in the ancient Province of Brittany, on 8 September 1780, in family Robert de la Mennais. He is one of the sons of Robert de Lamennais, a wealthy merchant who had recently received a coat of arms from the king, and Marie des Saudrais. He was five years old when his mother died, and as a result, he and his younger brother were sent for education to an uncle, Robert des Saudrais, at La Chênaie, an estate near Saint-Malo. During the period of the Revolution, the family sheltered non-juring priests who would lead Mass secretly in their home in the middle of the night. Jean-Marie began to express an interest in priesthood. In October 1790 he made his First Communion and received Confirmation from Gabriel Cortois de Pressigny, the last Bishop of Saint-Malo, who went into exile the following May. The Reign of Terror came to Brittany in December 1793. Their father Robert was arrested and barely escaped the guillotine. Soon after he had returned from exile, Bishop Cortois de Pressigny installed Lamennais as a subdeacon on 21 December 1801 at the chapel of the Ursulines in Paris. The following year Lamennais helped the former rector of a secondary school previously run by the church, closed by the Revolution, to re-open the institution. To house the revived school, he and his brother, Hugues-Felicité purchased a former hospital. He was ordained a deacon at the Cathedral of Rennes on 24 September 1803 by Bishop Jean-Baptiste-Marie de Maille, Bishop of Rennes.