[2] She also helped to inspire the founding of a community of priests dedicated to missionary service, the Congregation of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Betharram.

Bichier was born in 1773 in the Château des Âges, home of her aristocratic family near the village of Le Blanc, then in the ancient province of Poitou (now the department of Indre), located in the Central Loire Valley.

[4] After the outbreak of the French Revolution, the local population resented the restrictions placed on the practice of the Catholic faith.

[4] Her brother's departure was to cause the remaining great distress, as the regulations of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy put into law by the National Constituent Assembly, which had declared all property of the Church to be declared national goods, were then being applied to émigrés like Laurent Bichier des Âges.

Under the Law of Suspects, the local Revolutionary Surveillance Committee then began to harass the family with daily visits, urging them to take the oath of loyalty to the Civil Constitution.

[5] The following year, a former servant came by the house and covertly informed them that a refractory priest would be presiding at a secret Mass at a farm in Marsyllis, about ten miles (15 km) away.

This was the Abbé Andrew Fournet, the underground pastor of Maillé, who would give Bichier a new direction in her life, answering her longings.

Elizabeth asked the permission of her mother, who agreed to this project, and a small school slowly began to develop at La Guimetière.

She found four other companions for this venture, and the following year, she and her servant, Marianne Meunier, went to the Congregation of Divine Providence in Poitiers to learn the fundamentals of consecrated life.

When they returned to La Guimetière in 1806, they were joined by two of Bichier's friends, Véronique de Lavergne and Madeleine Moreau.

In February 1807, the five community members professed religious vows, establishing the new congregation of the Sisters of the Cross.