Frédéric Ozanam
1813-1853 19th century Feast day: September 9
Turning faith into concrete service, charity invented between equals.
Who was Frédéric Ozanam?
A Lyon academic, historian of literature at the Sorbonne, married and a father. At twenty, with a few friends, he founded the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul to visit the poor in their homes, as equals.
In their own words
The question that stirs the world around us is neither one of persons nor of political forms, but a social question.
I would like to enfold the whole world in a network of charity.
The poor we see with the eyes of the flesh; they are there, and we can put our finger and our hand into their wounds.