Agnès Galand was born on November 17, 1602, in Le Puy-en-Velay, France, the third of seven children of Pierre Galand, a by trade, and his wife, Guillemette Massiote. When she was five years old, Agnes was entrusted to a religious institute for her education. Even from that early age, she showed a strong sense of spiritual maturity. She consecrated herself to the Virgin Mary at the age of seven. Agnes joined the Dominican Monastery of St. Catherine of Siena at Langeac in 1623. At her receiving of the religious habit she took the name Agnes of Jesus. Soon after her own profession, she was assigned to serve as the Mistress of novices for the community. Agnes was elected to lead her community as prioress in 1627. She was later deposed from this office, but she accepted her demotion with indifference and grace. She died on October 19, 1634, in Langeac.
I shall simply relate an incident which I read in the life of Mother Agnes of Jesus, a Dominican nun of the convent of Langeac in Auvergne.... One day the Blessed Virgin appeared to Mother Agnes and put a gold chain around her neck to show her how happy she was that Mother Agnes had become the slave of both her and her Son. And St. Cecilia, who accompanied our Lady, said to her, "Happy are the faithful slaves of the Queen of Heaven, for they will enjoy true freedom."
In 1631, Agnes experienced the most famous of her visions, in which the Blessed Virgin Mary urged her to pray for an unknown priest with the command, "Pray to my Son for the Abbé of Prébrac." MonsignorJean-Jacques Olier was the current holder of that office, and while at a retreat led by Saint Vincent de Paul, he experienced a vision in which Mother Agnes appeared to him, though he was unacquainted with her. He sought out the nun who had appeared to him in the dream. When he met Agnes, she told him: "I have received orders from the Holy Virgin to pray for you. God has destined you to open the first seminaries in France." Olier would go on to found the Society of Saint-Sulpice. Before her death, she related to her community her great desire that they pray for priests. She also had visions of both her guardian angel and Satan.
A cause for her beatification was introduced on April 19, 1713. She was declared venerable on March 19, 1808, by Pope Pius VII. Pope John Paul II beatified her on November 20, 1994. At her beatification ceremony, John Paul II called Agnes "truly blessed", noting her willingness to submit to God's plan for her, "offering her intellect, will, and freedom to the Son of Man, that he might transform them and harmonize them totally with his own!" Her feast day is October 19. Blessed Hyacinthe-Marie Cormier, beatified on the same day as Agnes, cited the example of Agnes's life as his inspiration for joining the Dominican Order. He would go on to be elected the seventy-sixth Master General of the Dominicans in 1904.
