Peter Julian Eymard

Peter Julian Eymard was born on 4 February 1811 in La Mure, a town in the Isère department of southeastern France. He grew up in a Catholic household of modest means; his father worked as a cutler and for a time opposed his son’s wish to become a priest. Frail health also interrupted his studies. After these obstacles were overcome, he was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Grenoble in 1834 and undertook parish ministry in the region, including service as a pastor. Already in these years he showed a marked devotion to the Eucharist and a concern for people who were poorly instructed in the faith.

In 1839 Eymard entered the Society of Mary, the Marist congregation, and thereafter worked as a preacher, spiritual director, and religious superior. He served as provincial of the Marists in France and was connected with the shrine of Our Lady of La Salette. During his Marist years his conviction grew that the Church needed a community wholly dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament—to adoration, to making the Eucharist better known, and to drawing the indifferent and the poor to the sacraments. This inner call eventually led him, with due permissions, to leave the Marists in order to begin a new foundation.

In 1856, in Paris, he established the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament. Its members combined prolonged Eucharistic adoration with an apostolate among the urban poor, preparing children and adults for First Communion and promoting more frequent reception of the sacrament. In 1858 he founded a companion institute for women, the Servants of the Blessed Sacrament, devoted primarily to contemplative adoration. The early communities lived in real poverty, moved often, and suffered from internal difficulties and from Eymard’s worsening health, yet he continued to write, to form his disciples, and to spread houses of adoration.

Worn out by labor and illness, Eymard returned to La Mure, where he died on 1 August 1868. He was beatified by Pope Pius XI in 1925 and canonized by Pope John XXIII on 9 December 1962. His liturgical memorial is kept on 2 August. Often called the Apostle of the Eucharist, he is remembered for placing the Mass and Eucharistic adoration at the center of Christian life and for linking worship of the reserved sacrament with care for those distant from the Church.