Pierre Joseph Picot de Clorivière was born in Saint-Malo, Brittany, France. While studying law in Paris, a diocesan priest invited him to make a retreat. It was during those prayerful days that he experienced what he called his conversion – a growing interest in prayer and an increased love of God. It was also during this time of grace that he first thought about the priesthood.
On Feb 23, 1756, when leaving church, a woman he did not know said to him: “God is calling you under the protection of St Ignatius and St Francis Xavier. This is the novitiate. Enter it.” He went back into the church and prayed and when he left, he was convinced that God wanted him to become a Jesuit.
Fr. de Clorivière prayed ardently for a cure for a speech impediment, and his prayers were answered one Sunday morning in 1780, as he began his sermon and spoke eloquently - free of his stuttering. He remained at this parish until 1786 when the bishop appointed him director of the diocesan school at Dinan.
With the coming of the French Revolution and the persecution of the Church, Fr. de Clorivière found his ministry curtailed at home. Thinking that he could work to restore the Society in the United States, he wrote to Bishop John Carroll of Baltimore, whom he knew as a student in Liege, asking to work in his diocese. Providence changed his mind and he committed himself to labor for the Society’s restoration in his native France. He founded the Society of Daughters of the Heart of Mary in 1791.
On January 9, 1820, he woke up at 2:45 am as usual to spend the next hour meditating in his cold room. At 4:00 am he went to the chapel to make his adoration, kneeling at the communion rail. When the community came in at 4:30 am, the Jesuits discovered that their beloved father had died in prayer at his place before the Blessed Sacrament. Fr. de Clorivière was 85 when he was laid to rest.
Communion rail that Fr. de Clorivière knelt at when he passed away. It is located at the DHM Mother House in Paris, France.
