PARADIS, MARIE-LÉONIE, BL.

Baptized Alodie Virginie, foundress of the Little Sisters of the Holy Family; b. May 12, 1840, at L'Acadie (Sainte Marguerite de Blairfindie, a suburb of Montréal), Québec, Canada; d. May 3, 1912, at Sherbrooke, Québec.

She was the daughter of a miller, who sent her to a boarding school run by the Sisters of Notre Dame at Saint-Laurent. Paradis entered the religious life at age thirteen, taking vows in 1857 as a Holy Cross sister. She was sent to St. Vincent's Orphanage in New York City. For sometime she taught in various schools. In 1864, she was given charge of the domestic work in an Indiana household. Later she had the same responsibilities at St. Joseph's College, Memramcook, New Brunswick.

Finding many young women eager to join her in this vocation, she formed a new community, Little Sisters of the Holy Family (1880), which received canonical approval in 1896 and papal approbation in 1905. The sisters work in the kitchens, laundries, and sacristies of colleges, seminaries, episcopal residences, and retirement homes for priests. They began with the household management of the apostolic delegations in Canada and Washington, DC. In 1885, the novitiate was transferred to Sherbrooke, Québec, where the motherhouse was later established. Although Mother Marie-Léonie was frail and often ill, she continued her service until a few hours before her peaceful death.

At her beatification in Montréal, Sept. 11, 1984, John Paul II declared that Marie-Léonie "never shied away from the various forms of manual labor which is the lot of so many people today and which held a special place in the Holy Family and in the life of Jesus of Nazareth himself."

Feast: May 4 (Canada).

Bibliography: Acta Apostolicae Sedis 78 (1986): 13–15. L'Osservatore Romano, English edition, no. 39 (1984): 9.

[k. i. rabenstein]