Home Missions

So he applied for the dangerous and demanding Canadian missions, but his superiors refused the request, desiring that he should remain and dedicate himself to the home missions of France. Staying for a short time at Nantes with a priest-friend, who trained men for the home missions, he then continued to Poitiers—a place which, like Francis and Assisi, was destined to be inseparably associated with his name.

In the meantime, however, he had antagonized the Jansenists by his open opposition to their teaching. They held that Christ the Redeemer had shed his blood only for the predestinate and that the conditions for the reception of the Sacraments (especially Penance and the Eucharist) should be as severe and exacting as possible.