François de Laval

Laval was born on 30 April 1623 in Montigny-Sur-Avre in the ancient Province of Perche, now the Department of Eure-et-Loir. His father Hugues de Laval, a member of the House of Laval, was the Seigneur of Montigny, Montbaudry, Alaincourt and Revercourt. His mother Michelle de Péricard (daughter of Nicolas Péricard and Anne de Chantelou) was from a family of hereditary officers of the Crown in Normandy. Her brother was François de Péricard, bishop of Évreux. Despite his family's heritage, his parents were not considered to be wealthy. Montigny was considered equivalent to a good-sized market-town. François (Francis) was baptized on 30 April 1623 in St. Martin's Church in Montigny-sur-Avre. He was named after Francis Xavier canonized in 1622, by Pope Gregory XV. Laval had five brothers and two sisters. His youngest brother Henri entered the Benedictine Order and his sister Anne Charlotte entered the Congregation of Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament. He was a descendant of John of Brienne, Berengaria of León, Louis of Brienne, Guy VII de Laval and Matthew II of Montmorency.

Laval's mother served as an example of piety and encouraged him to be charitable to those who were less fortunate. Often described as destined for an ecclesiastical lifestyle, Laval was recognized as a clear-sighted and intelligent boy and he was admitted into the "privileged ranks of those who comprised the Congregation of the Holy Virgin." This was a society founded by the Jesuits, who aimed to inspire young people to adopt religious lifestyles, and encouraged regular prayer and spiritual practices. At the age of eight, Laval received the tonsure and took minor orders, which then allowed him to enter the College of La Flèche (Collège Henri-IV) in 1631, an institution that educated the sons of elite families and guaranteed him a good education. There Laval came into contact with reports of the Jesuit missions to the Huron in Canada, which inspired him to become a missionary, like his patron saint Francis Xavier.

In 1637, Laval was appointed a canon of the Cathedral of Évreux by the Bishop of Évreux. The death of Laval's father in September 1636 left his family in a precarious financial situation. François received revenue from the prebend attached to his position as a canon, which allowed him to continue his education. Once he completed his classical education at the age of nineteen, Laval left La Flèche to study philosophy and theology at the College de Clermont in Paris.

However the death of his two oldest brothers in the battles at Nördlingen in 1634 and Freiburg in 1644 made him the head of the family. His mother, the Bishop of Évreux, and his cousin all argued he should abandon his ecclesiastical career. Instead Laval helped his mother settle the family's affairs and renounced his rights of primogeniture, which then passed to his brother Jean-Louis.

Laval returned to his studies in Paris and on 1 May 1647 he was ordained a priest. The Bishop of Évreux, regretting his earlier attempt to persuade Laval to change his career path, appointed him archdeacon of his diocese in December 1647. In this post Laval oversaw 155 parishes and four chapels. Laval was said to approach this task with fervour and enthusiasm. In the following years, he devoted himself to establishing order in the parishes, providing relief for the poor, caring for the sick, and engaging in various charitable activities. In 1654, presented with the possibility of serving as a missionary in Asia, he resigned as archdeacon, but the project was abandoned and he was left without a clerical position.

Freed of all responsibility, Laval spent three years at a spiritual retreat near Caen known as the Hermitage, founded by Jean de Bernières-Louvigny, a lay leader in the reform of the Catholic Church in France. There he also made the acquaintance of the founder's nephew, Henri de Bernières, who became an invaluable assistant in later years. In addition to prayer and charitable work, he took on the responsibility of reforming a monastery whose morals were thought to be too lax and became the administrator of two monasteries of nuns. His dedication to these projects earned him commendation from François de Servien, Bishop of Bayeux, who described him as a priest "of great piety, prudent and of unusually great competence in business matters, [who had set] fine examples of virtue".