Marie-Thérèse Charlotte de Lamourous

Marie-Thérèse de Lamourous (November 1, 1754 – September 14, 1836) was a French laywoman who was a member of the underground Catholic Church during the French Revolution. After the Revolution she founded a house for repentant prostitutes at Bordeaux called La Maison de La Miséricorde ("The House of Mercy").

Early life Marie Thérèse Charlotte de Lamourous was born at Barsac, Gironde on November 1, 1754. She was the first of 11 children born to Louis Marc Antoine de Lamourous du Mayne and Elisabeth de Vincens de Lamourous du Mayne. Only five children survived into adulthood. Both families were prominent and very old French nobility. Louis Marc Antoine was a lawyer (after his father) and was attached to the Bordeaux parlement.

The family moved to Bordeaux in 1766, when de Lamourous was 12. She received her First Communion in 1767 and was educated by her mother, who had attended a convent school.

The French Revolution With the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, de Lamourous (then 35) engaged in the underground Catholic Church. She was an important link in the network of ministries and good works that developed under the vicar general of the Archdiocese of Bordeaux, Joseph Boyer. Aside from visiting the sick, teaching catechism, visiting prisoners and helping to keep the clergy in touch, de Lamourous, dressed as a peasant, would enter the offices of the committee of supervision and read the list of planned arrests and executions while pretending to clean the building. She used this information to help people escape the guillotine.

In 1794 authorities in Paris expelled all French nobility from France's port cities. De Lamourous, her father, two sisters, and two very young nephews moved to the family’s estate at Pian. De Lamourous visited the filles. While there she experienced a profound sense of calm, peace, and joy. She found the women pleasant and comforting. However upon leaving her feelings of reproach and uneasiness returned. After an illness, and a very bad dream about the future of the filles, de Lamourous agreed to visit the house again, absentmindedly grabbing her nightcap as she left. On January 2, 1801 she toured the house, again met with the filles, and again was filled with the same warm feelings from before. As the day drew to a close, she escorted de Pichon and Chaminade to the door, and saw them out saying: "I will stay here." She became the "Bonne Mère" ("Good mother") to the filles ("daughters") and the work was called La Maison de La Miséricorde ("The House of Mercy"). De Lamourous chose Our Lady of Mercy as patron of the house.

The Sisters of Miséricorde This was to be de Lamourous major focus and work for the rest of her life, but getting started wasn't easy; the women were of varied ages and came from all walks of life, bickering, fighting, and accusations were a part of everyday life. To combat this, and to help form the women into virtuous, dedicated, sincere Christians, de Lamourous wrote a strict daily schedule for the house, divided strictly into prayer times, meal times, work periods, and recreation periods. The Miséricorde was unique because the staff (called directresses) and the filles shared their lives entirely, they slept in common dormitories, dined in common, worked alongside each other, and prayed in common. Over the years the Miséricorde grew from the original 15 women, to almost 300 women in 1835 (the year before de Lamourous's death). The growth required more space, and Lamourous was able to obtain the former convent of the Annunciation. In 1989, the Sacred Congregation for the Causes of Saints decreed that de Lamourous had practiced heroic virtue during her lifetime, thus she was given the title Venerable.