Marcellin Rouchouze

Who they were

Jean-Marie Rouchouze was born on 14 December 1810 at Saint-Julien-en-Jarez in the French Loire, the eldest of three children. Like his father, a brother and a sister, he entered the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (the Picpus Fathers), taking the name Brother Marcellin and professing vows before the founder, Father Pierre-Marie Coudrin, in 1837. He taught Latin, mathematics and philosophy in Belgium and France and, though he considered himself unworthy, was persuaded by the Curé of Ars to be ordained a priest in 1852, at almost forty-two.

In 1865 he became secretary general of the Congregation in Paris under his brother, the superior general, keeping the post after his brother's death. When the Paris Commune uprising broke out in 1871 he was one of the few religious who stayed behind after the evacuation of the motherhouse; arrested on 12 April with the superior general's three other councillors, he was held in the Conciergerie and Mazas prisons. He was shot on 26 May 1871 near the rue Haxo together with three Jesuit priests, a diocesan priest and seminarian, and Father Henri Planchat. He was beatified on 22 April 2023 in Paris, and his relics rest in the founders' crypt at the Picpus cemetery.

The miracles

As a martyr he was raised to the altars without a miracle.

Why that counted as sanctity

Picpus Father shot during the Paris Commune for remaining with his community; beatified 22 April 2023.

The cause

Connected on this site

• Henri Planchat Blessed
  “He is honoured with four priests of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, among them Ladislas Radigue, Polycarpe Tuffier and Marcellin Rouchouze.” — this site's research