Jean-Marie Vianney arrived in Ars on 13 February 1818. At that time Ars was a neglected little village in the Dombes, and the future Parish priest of Ars a young priest of 32. He had been born in 1786 into a peasant family in Dardilly, near Lyon, and from an early age wanted to be a priest to "win souls for the Lord". Getting training was hard in that troubled period following the French Revolution.
Over the next 41 years, Jean-Marie Vianney touched the hearts of his parishioners in Ars by showing them God's forgiveness and the joy of being children of God. He awoke their faith by his preaching but above all by his prayers and his lifestyle. He felt unequal to the task before him, but let himself be taken up in God's mercy. He restored and decorated his church, founded an orphanage – The Providence – and cared for the poorest.

His reputation as a confessor very soon drew to him many pilgrims seeking God's forgiveness and peace of mind; more than 90,000 came in the last year of his life. Although assailed by many trials and struggles, his heart remained rooted in the love of God and his fellow men; his sole concern was the salvation of souls. His catechisms and sermons spoke above all of the goodness and mercy of God. He died on 4 August 1859, having exhausted himself in Love; he knew that he would one day die as a "prisoner of the confessional".
He was beatified on the 8 January 1905 and later that year he was declared “patron of the priests of France”, he was canonised in 1925 by Pius XI, and in 1929 proclaimed “patron saint of all the parish priests in the world”. Pope Jean-Paul II, on a visit to Ars in 1986, said: "The parish priest of Ars remains a peerless example for every country, both in how he performed his ministry and the holiness of the minister". In 1988 a seminary was opened to train future priests.