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 Saint John Baptist de la Salle 300th Anniversary of Death Scott 1718 (2019) Artist Chiara Principe designed the stamp shown above, which was issued in 2019 to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the death of Saint John Baptiste de la Salle on April 7, 1719. John Baptiste de la Salle was the founder of the Congregation of Christian Brothers, which established schools in France and which went on to spread throughout the world. He was born on April 30, 1651, into a noble family. When his parents died in the early 1670s, he left the seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris to take charge of educating his younger siblings. He was ordained a priest in 1676 and later received a doctorate in theology. He first established a school for girls and later began schools for boys, especially working to train teachers to be effective in their work with innovative approaches to teaching children from artisan and poorer families. De la Salle eventually established the Institute of the Brothers of Christian Schools. This organization did not include priests. A religious institute of laymen was an innovation for the times. Formation of a consecrated institute met with opposition from ecclesiastical authorities but the success of the schools in bringing education to those who would not ordinarily have an opportunity proved to be a successful movement. Today, there are over a million students in 1,500 Lasallian institutions in 82 countries.  Statue of Saint John-Baptiste de la Salle Paris, France Photo by Peter Potrowl From Wikimedia Commons Used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license John Baptiste de la Salle was canonized in 1900 and proclaimed a patron saint of teachers in 1950. Many schools are named after La Salle, including La Salle University in Philadelphia. Articles: |
