- St. Vincent de Paul
The Society of St. Vincent de Paul was founded in 1833 by Frederic Ozanam. It was named for a saint who served the sick and poor nearly 200 years earlier.
As a young priest, Vincent de Paul was captured by Turkish pirates and sold into slavery in Tunisia. Upon his release, he returned to Paris, where his duties included serving as a chaplain to imprisoned galley-slaves.
He helped found the Congregation of the Mission (the Vincentians) and the Daughters of Charity, whose mission is to aid the poor and the sick.
The first St. Vincent de Paul Society in the United States was founded at the Basilica of St. Louis in the city of St. Louis, Missouri, in 1845.
- Little Burgundy Book, Diocese of Saginaw