Venerable Juliette Colbert de Barolo

Juliette Colbert Falletti de Barolo (26 June 1786 – 19 January 1864) - born as Juliette Victoire Colbert and known in Italy as Giulia Falletti di Barolo - was a French Roman Catholic philanthropist and the founder of both the Sisters of Saint Anne and the Daughters of Jesus the Good Shepherd. Colbert was a well-educated girl living in France during and after the tumultuous French Revolution which caused her faith to deepen since she had the desire to aid the poor and neglected. Her marriage to a nobleman in Paris led to the two setting off to live in Turin where the couple threw themselves into charitable works. The couple bore no children but rather "adopted" the town's poor. Colbert was widowed some decades later and became professed into the Secular Franciscan Order while establishing hospitals and schools as well as other charitable institutions. Her cause for canonization opened in late 1990 (she became titled as a Servant of God) and culminated in mid-2015 when Pope Francis confirmed her heroic virtue and named her as Venerable. Her husband's cause was opened in 1995 and he remains a Servant of God. Juliette Victorienne Françoise Colbert was born in Maulévrier on 26 June 1786 as the second of four children to the nobles Edouard Victurnien Charles René Colbert (15 December 1754-August 1839) and Annemarie Louise de Crénolle (the couple married on 12 March 1782). Her father served as an ambassador for Maximilian Franz von Österreich. Her ancestor was the former Finance Minister Jean Baptiste Colbert who served for King Louis XIV (either the great-granddaughter or descended from his brother). In October 1793 her mother died in Brussels leaving her father to care for the children. Her siblings (in order) were: Her father remarried on 19 April 1812 to Pauline Le Clerc and she had a half-brother in René-Oliver (b. 19 March 1813).