The Patron of Forgotten People: Jane Frances de Chantal and the Door That Opened Inward

In 1601, Jane Frances de Chantal locked the gate at Bourbilly castle and walked away from everything she had built --- a widow at twenty-eight, with four children and a broken heart and a set of obligations she hadn't chosen. What she built next would outlast her by centuries. The Visitation Order she founded with Francis de Sales did something quietly radical: it opened its doors to the women every other religious order had turned away --- too old, too sick, too complicated for the existing structures. Jane's famous response to her critics was not a defense. It was a declaration: I like sick people. I'm on their side. In this episode, Harmonia traces the thread from a cold Burgundy courtyard to eighty-six houses across France, and forward into a world that still produces people standing outside closed doors --- and people who refuse to leave them there. Transcript available at: https://harmonia.email/podcast-episode/patron-forgotten-people-jane-frances-de-chantal-and-door-opened-inward Share and read comments: https://harmonia.email/podcast-comments?field_podcast_feed_value=the_golden_thread&from_node=382