Childhood
She was born on 12 July 1751, at Cuvilly, Picardy, Beauvais, Oise, France, the sixth of seven children of Jean-François Billiart and Marie-Louise-Antoinette (née Debraine). By the age of seven, she knew the catechism by heart, and used to gather her companions around her to hear her recite it and to explain it to them. Her education was confined to the rudiments obtained at the village school kept by her uncle, Thibault Guilbiert. In spiritual things her progress was so rapid that the parish priest, Father Dangicourt, allowed her to make her First Communion and to be confirmed aged 9. She took a vow of chastity five years later.
She was held in very high esteem for her virtue and piety, and was commonly called, "the saint of Cuvilly". When twenty-two years old, a nervous shock, occasioned by a pistol-shot fired at her father by an unknown enemy, brought on a paralysis of the lower limbs. Within a few years she was confined to her bed, and remained incapacitated for 22 years. During this time, when she received Holy Communion daily, Julie exercised an uncommon gift of prayer, spending four or five hours a day in contemplation. The rest of her time was occupied in making linens and laces for the altar and in catechizing the village children whom she gathered around her bed, giving special attention to those who were preparing for their First Communion.
Read more about this topic: Julie Billiart
Famous quotes containing the word childhood:
“Modern children were considerably less innocent than parents and the larger society supposed, and postmodern children are less competent than their parents and the society as a whole would like to believe. . . . The perception of childhood competence has shifted much of the responsibility for child protection and security from parents and society to children themselves.”
—David Elkind (20th century)
“The quickness with which all the “stuff” from childhood can reduce adult siblings to kids again underscores the strong and complex connections between brothers and sisters.... It doesn’t seem to matter how much time has elapsed or how far we’ve traveled. Our brothers and sisters bring us face to face with our former selves and remind us how intricately bound up we are in each other’s lives.”
—Jane Mersky Leder (20th century)
“By contemplation’s help,not sought in vain,
I seem t’ have liv’d my childhood o’er again;
To have renew’d the joys that once were mine,”
—William Cowper (1731–1800)