IFTTT Autopost 
Marie Guillemette (Wilhelmina) Emilie de Rodat, more commonly known in history as Émilie or Emily de Rodat, was born to a noble family on September 6, 1787, in Rodez, Aveyron, France.
Because of the French Revolution and the government’s persecution of Catholics and other Christians, the family sent 18-month-old Emily to live with her maternal grandmother in a remote area that was relatively safe from the revolution’s persecution. An aunt whose convent was closed by the revolutionary government, also lived in the house.
Emily received a firm foundation in her Catholic faith, though this had to be done in secret. At age eleven, Emily received her First Communion.
When Emily was sixteen, she not only moved back to her parents’ home, but she also had a spiritual awakening.
When she was eighteen, Emily returned to Villefranche and became a teacher. There, in addition to overseeing girls’ recreation, she taught geography and prepared the girls for their First Communion.
At the school, Emily was greatly influenced by Abbé Marty, spiritual director of the school. In fact, she had him as her spiritual director from 1805 to 1839. During this time, Emily decided that God was calling her to religious life, and she joined three orders of sisters, but none of them was a good fit for her. Instead of blaming the communities of sisters, she blamed herself for her “restlessness and instability.”
One spring day in 1815, Emily overheard some poor women talking about how sad it was that their daughters had no formal religious education because the Ursuline sisters who had taught them in the past for free were driven away during the French Revolution.
Emily decided to do what she could to help remedy the situation for poor girls. Therefore, in 1815, Emily started teaching a school for forty girls with three other women to help her. This group foreshadowed the religious community Emily would eventually establish.
With Father Marty’s help, Emily and her group rented a building where she and her helpers taught 100 girls. As time went on, Emily established other schools, and her community continued to grow. Though they suffered growing pains like any new group experiences, they established the Sisters of the Holy Family of Villefranche that was formally approved by the bishop of Rodez in 1832.
As time went on, the sisters not only taught girls, they also began visiting prisoners, opened orphanages, built rescue homes for prostitutes, and founded a retirement center for elderly religious. Mother Emily also established a separate branch of her order to live a contemplative lifestyle to pray for the success of the sisters in the apostolic/missionary life.
By 1852, there were 32 Villefrance convents and five contemplative communities of the order.
Personally, Mother Emily suffered much in her physical, spiritual, and emotional life. Her health was never strong, and she developed cancer in her left eye, a cancerous tumor on her nose, and chronic tinnitus in her ears. At times, she was overwhelmed with sadness and what her biographers call “spiritual despair.” Her personality was also not her friend, for once she made up her mind, it was difficult dealing with her. One member of her order said that Emily was “a saint, but a stubborn saint.” Though she was noted for her uncompromising nature, she was gentle with her critics.
Mother Emily died on September 19, 1852. At the time of her death, her order had 38 convents for the active sisters, 25 cloistered communities, and 32 schools with over 5,000 students in several countries. By 1999, there were 520 Sisters of the Holy Family of Villefranche worldwide.
Emily was canonized by Pope Pius XII on April 23, 1950, and Saint Emily de Rodat’s feast day is September 19.
