Isabelle was gifted in many ways: she was beautiful, intelligent, and virtuous. She was well-known for her charity to others. Daily, she invited poor people to her dinner table, waiting on them herself. She spent her evenings visiting the poor and the sick.
As a child, she requested spiritual direction and became even more devoted to the Lord, under the guidance of the Franciscans. She sought holiness above all else and refused to marry, but consecrated her virginity and her entire life to God alone.
In 1252, Isabelle founded a cloister for Franciscan nuns, which she built just four miles from Paris, at Longchamp. She had a great love for the virtue of humility and named the Monastery of the Humility of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The rules, which were written by St. Bonaventure, were unique to this group of women, who prayed, fasted, and provided assistance to the poor. Isabelle never joined the community herself, but after her mother died, did live in the monastery in a room apart from the nuns’ cells. She maintained a discipline of silence for most of her day. She suffered from many illnesses during her life, which prevented her from following the rule of life for the nuns which was one reason she refused to be named abbess of the monastery. This also allowed her to retain her wealth and possessions, in order to fund the monastery and to support the poor.
Her life of prayer was marked by ecstasies at several points of her life, including a period of time near the end of her life when she stayed awake through several nights in rapt contemplation. Isabelle died at Longchamp in 1270 and was buried in the monastery church. Many miracles have since occurred at her burial site. Her cult was approved in 1521. She is the patroness of sick people.
