The Seventeenth-Century School of French Spirituality

Abstract

The French school of spirituality, a controversial term, can include all the leaders of the Church’s renewal in seventeenth-century France or can be limited to Pierre de Berulle and his first followers. This article describes some of the school’s main figures (Berulle, Charles de Condren, Jean-Jacques Olier, and John Eudes), its characteristics, and representative texts. The school’s leaders were mystics who underwent profound spiritual evolutions. They adored God, focused on forming a relationship with Jesus, and were devoted to the Spirit and Mary. They saw the Church and moral actions as the continuation of Jesus’s work. Their missionary commitment was aimed at France and extended beyond it. They were particularly interested in the proper formation of priests, something that was greatly lacking in France at the time. The laity’s education was also important to them.