During its first eight years, the new order also was unusual in its public outreach, in contrast to most female religious who remained cloistered and adopted strict ascetic practices.

[4] Having turned down two prior suitors, in 1592, she married the Baron de Chantal when she was 20 and they lived in the feudal Castle of Bourbilly.

Chantal gained a reputation as an excellent manager of the estates of her husband, as well as of her difficult father-in-law, while also providing alms and nursing care to needy neighbors.

She had not long returned to Bourbilly when she received a letter from her widowed father-in-law demanding that she live with him in his castle at Monthelon, Saône-et-Loire.

In 1604, her father invited her to come to Dijon to hear the bishop of Geneva, Francis de Sales, preach the Lenten sermons at the Sainte Chapelle.

He "...bade her avoid scruples, hurry, and anxiety of mind, which above all things hinder a soul on the road to spiritual perfection.

With the death of De Sales' mother, Chantal moved to Annecy to be of assistance to Marie Aymée with her remaining daughter Françoise.

During its first eight years, the new order also was unusual in its public outreach, in contrast to most female religious who remained cloistered and adopted strict ascetic practices.

The usual opposition to women in active ministry arose and Francis de Sales was obliged to make it a cloistered community following the Rule of St. Augustine.

Chantal outlived her son (who died fighting Huguenots and English on the Île de Ré during the century's religious wars) and two of her three daughters, but left extensive correspondence.

[9] In 2001, Pope John Paul II included in the General Roman Calendar the memorial of Our Lady of Guadalupe on 12 December.

[12] Jane Frances de Chantal is invoked as the patron of forgotten people, widows, and parents who are separated from their children.