APPARITION OF OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846)




Maximin Giraud and Mélanie Calvat / OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846)

STATUS: APPARITION APPROVED BY THE CHURCH – one of the few apparitions that has also received Vatican approval as well as approval from the local bishop.


::::::::::::

For the story of La Salette, I will quote the account of the apparition to the children, and the story of how the Secrets told to them were eventually written down and sent to Bl Pius IX from a book recounting the famous Marian apparitions entitled '

'The Sun Her Mantle' by John Beevers, (published by Browne and Nolan, LTD / The Richview Press, Dublin 1953).


(Any additional sources, observations and / or notes from me about the texts and a chronology of events as they occurred will be added in parentheses like this, or clearly indicated in separate sections, or marked as OBSERVATIONS or NOTES, etc.)

Also, I will include the ORIGNAL VERSIONS of the SECRETS of La Salette that the two seers sent to His Holiness Bl Pius IX in July 1851 and were rediscovered in the Vatican Archives by Fr Michel Corteville in 1999: he published the copies of Secret complete with images of the letters and the original envelopes in which they were sent.

This publication of the original Secrets cannot be a hoax as the letters complete with childish handwriting, various misspellings and the envelopes match eyewitness descriptions of the letters before they were sent to the Pope. Source for the original Secrets and images I have found on the 'Miracle Hunter's Website' which quote Fr. Michel Corteville's findings,

!!! IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING THE CONTROVERSY of the LAST VERSION OF MÉLANIE'S SECRET -Apparition of the Blessed Virgin on the Mountain of La Salette originally received an Imprimatur from the Bishop of Lecce, but bitter controversy over the contents of the Secret arose even after receiving the Imprimatur.

The controversy over whether the Imprimatur should be revoked and the publication banned was so dire, that the Holy See ordered a ban on the matter in December 1915 declaring that the question of the Secrets should NO LONGER BE TREATED or DISCUSSED IN ANY FORM under PAIN OF DEPRIVATION OF THE SACRAMENTS, and if a priest, they be deprived of saying Mass, etc.:


    "It has come to the knowledge of this Supreme Congregation that there are still persons, even ecclesiastics, who, in spite of the answers and decisions of the Sacred Congregation itself, continue, by books, pamphlets, and articles published in periodicals, whether signed or anonymous, to discuss the question of the Secrets of La Salette, its various texts, its adaptations to our present times or to the future - and these, not only without the approbation of their Bishops, but even in spite of their express prohibition. In order that these abuses, which are hurtful to true piety, and seriously attack ecclesiastical authority, may be repressed, the same Sacred Congregation orders the faithful of all countries to abstain from treating and discussing this said question, under whatsoever pretext or form, either in books, pamphlets, or articles signed or and anonymous, or in any other way.

This decree is not contrary to the devotion to the Blessed Virgin, invoked and known under the title of 'Reconciler of La Salette'.


Then, a reprint of the 1879 Secret was put on the Index of Forbidden Books in 1923 – it has been debated that the reprint had bad unapproved material added and was condemned, not the original 1879 booklet, but since the Holy See had condemned any and all treatments and discussions past that date, it appears the placement of the pamphlet on the Index was not due just to the added material but also the general order of ordered in the 1915 Decree issued from the Holy See.

TO DATE, the 1915 DECREE IS STILL IN EFFECT: after only just discovering this, I was concerned I may not ever be able to post the Secret at all, but it appears that only PERSONAL COMMENTARIES, INTERPRETATIONS, and DISCCUSIONS on the Secret IN ANY FORM is FORBIDDEN: the Secret may still be reprinted, but without any further commentary. We may have the text, read it, print it, but not comment publicly or write any commentaries on it.

Therefore, I will post the original version of the Secrets of 1851 sent to Bl Pius IX, and ONLY Maximin's Second Version as it CORRESPONDS WITH THE ORIGINAL of 1851 as there is no question to their authenticity and therefore do not even need a commentary or explanation, thereby remaining obedient to the Holy See.


As this article will be long, it will be section into parts.




::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::

PART ONE: THE APPARITION “The Tears of Our Lady”

(From 'The Sun Her Mantle', pp. 22-33)


“The little town of Corps, some thirty miles south of Grenoble, was a mean and poverty-stricken place in the 1840s. Most of its thirteen hundred inhabitants were indifferent or hostile to religion, and it is said that, to be the Curé of Corps, a priest needed 'an iron character and a will of steel, with a heart incapable of being hurt by the insults and discourtesy to which he would be constantly subjected.'

Here, on November 7, 1831 were born Françoise Mélanie Calvat and, on August 27, 1835, Pierre Maximin Giraud, both into poor and shiftless families. Maximin´s father was a wheelwright, a trade which should have brought him sufficient income, for Corps was a posting stage on the main road between Grenoble and Gap, but he neglected his work and spent too much time and money drinking in cafés. So he was always poor and sometimes penniless, and his home was a squalid hovel. His first wife died soon after Maximin was born, and his second wife was a woman who behaved like the wicked stepmother in a fairy-tale. Maximin would often have gone hungry but for one of his little brothers who shared his food with him. From time to time, his fathers made half-hearted efforts to send Maximin to school, but the boy was a perpetual truant and knew neither how to read and write. He was almost as ignorant in religious matters, going neither to Mass nor catechism classes. His father tried to teach him the Our Father and the Hail Mary, but without success. With a few other boys hos own age, Maximin lived an uncontrolled, irregular life, hanging round the two hotels when the stage-coach arrived, gathering horse-droppings from the road, taking his father's goat to pasture and some days doing nothing at all, and getting his food where and when he could.

Mélanie's father worked in a timber-yard and he. Too, was desperately poor. As a little child, Mélanie was sent out to beg in the streets of Corps From the age of eight, she went to work with the farmers of the surrounding district, looking after the cows as they grazed on the mountain slopes. During December, January and February, when the heavy snow kept the cattle indoors, she returned home to her family in Corps and helped her mothers to look after her brothers and sisters. She never went to school and was ignorant of the catechism. She could just manage to stumble through an Our Father in French, for the local patois (i.e. local peasant dialect) was her natural speech as it was for Maximin, although his life in the town and in its cafés had given him a better, though far from good, knowledge of French. Mélanie´s life was one of unremitting work. One of her employer's said: ' At dawn she took the animals to their pastures and returned with them in the evening. Then she had a meal and went straight to bed.'

In the summer of 1846, she was working for Baptiste Pra, a framer of Ablandins, one of the hamlets which made up the commune of La Salette. She knew nothing of Maximin. Their homes were at the opposite ends of Corps, she was only at home in the three winter months and there was almost four years' difference in their ages.

Another farmer of Ablandins, Pierre Selme, employed a youth to tend his cows, but the lad fell ill, and on Sunday, September 13, Selme came down to Corps to see Giraud, the wheelwright and asked him to lend him Maximin to look after his cows for a week. At first, Giraud was reluctant but, after much talking, he consented and so, next day at three o'clock n the morning, Pierre Selme called, collected Maximin and led him to Ablandins. He had been warned that Maximin was scatter-brained and so he kept him under close watch. Every day he went with him and worked cutting hay near the pasturage so that he could keep an eye on him, fearing that, if left to himself, Maximin would allow the cows to stray and perhaps injure or kill themselves by a fall into one of the many ravines which cut into the mountain-side. For this was very different country from the low, lush meadows of Normandy or any of the great pasture-lands of France. The cows ate thin, wiry mountain-grass, picking their way cautiously along the steep slopes more than five-thousand feet above sea level. At one spot there was a small plateau crossed by a stream and, on the first day, Selme led Maximin to it to show him where he could water the cows.

During the early part of the week, there was no meeting between Maximin and Mélanie who was tending cows nearby, but on the Thursday evening they met as they were taking the cattle home and spoke to each other. Next morning their little herds were on adjoining pastures, for Baptise Pra, Mélanie's employer, had told her to take his cows on to land next to that where Selme's animals were grazing, and the two children spent the afternoon together. In the evening they separated with the words: “We´ll go to the mountain again tomorrow. And we´ll see who is up and awake first.”

+++

When Saturday morning came, Maximin was up first and he and Mélanie, each driving their little herd of cows, met outside the village as the first rays of the sun touched the peaks far above them. Loulou, Maximin's dog, ran barking ahead and Pierre Selme came a few yards behind, his scythe on his shoulder. Maximin, always lively, sang and shouted as they made their way up the long steep slopes, but Mélanie still half asleep, was silent. At their destination, the two children went to their separate pastures, but were within a hundred yards of each other. Selme got on with his hay making. The morning went peacefully, as the cows ate and the children sat on the grass taking no notice of each other. At midday, the sound of the Angelus bell came from the church at La Salette three kilometres away. Selme shouted to Maximin, telling him to water the cows, and Maximin called across to Mélanie to ask her to go with him.

They drove their animals to a spot where the stream – the Spezia – had been partially damned by stones and lumps of turf, and waited until the cows had drunk all they wanted. Then they headed them to a fresh patch of grass and went off themselves to a spring – the People´s Spring – which came out of the earth near the left bank of the Spezia. Big stones were placed around it and on these they sat and ate – hunks of rye bread and the hard sour local cheese. It was a perfect early autumn day. The sun was warm. There was no breeze and the ring of the mountains stood sharp and clear against a blue and cloudless sky. Before long, three other children came to the spring, two boys and a girl who were also tending cows up the mountain. They had already eaten, and, after a drink, stayed a few minutes joking with Mélanie and Maximin before going back to their work. After they had left, the two children crossed over to the right of the Spezia and walked a few paces to another spring known as the Little Spring. It was dried up, but they dropped their satchels out on the grass. (…) Whatever the reason, they slept for more than an hour – something there were both unaccustomed to do in the middle of the day.

Mélanie was the first to wake She leapt to her feet. Where were the cows? She saw no sign of them and shook Maximin awake.

“Memin! Memin! Our cows! I don´t know where they are. We´ve got to find them quickly.”

Maximin, thoroughly alarmed, jumped up and ran with Mélanie across the Spezia and up the side of the little alley through which it flowed. The cows were safe, lying quietly chewing the cud on the spot where they had left them. The children counted them. There eight. Everything was all right, but they must now be driven back to the meadows where the day's grazing had begun. In their panic, the children had left their satchels behind on the stones by the Little Spring and Mélanie turned round to run back and fetch them.

A globe of dazzling light, almost too bright to be gazed upon, was revolving upon the stones. Later Mélanie said: “It was as if the sun had fallen there.” She halted and turned to Maximin who was a few steps behind her.

“Look, Memin! Look down there at that light!” she cried.

The lad ran up to her and then he too saw the globe of light. He was terrified and so was Mélanie who remembered that she had often been told she would see the devil unless she began to say her prayers regularly and stopped mocking those who did.

Like those earlier shepherds who 'were overcome with dear' when 'the glory of the Lord shone about them,´ they stood paralysed with terror, watching the globe begin to swirl and, as it were, boil within itself as it grew in size until it was just over five feet across. It shone and glittered with a living fire so intense that the children had to shade their eyes and screw them up before they could bear to look at it. Slowly the globe began to open and within its shifting splendour they could see the figure of a seated woman, her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands.

The children's fear increase. “Oh my God!” cried Mélanie and dropped the stick she was carrying. “Pick it up!” urged Maximin. “I´ve got mine and will give her a good thump with it if she tries to do anything to us.! Mélanie picked up her stick and they continued to stare at the apparition.

As they watched, the Lady took her hands from her face, stood up and folded her arms across her breast. She spoke:

“Come nearer, my children. Don't be afraid. I have come to give you important news.”

Her voice, low and musical, banished their fear. They ran and jumped across the stream. The Lady moved to meet them. When she spoke again, the children were standing in front of her, so near the no-one could have squeezed between her and them.

In the years that followed, Mélanie and Maximin were to describe their ´Beautiful Lady´ to thousands of people. She was tall. They had never before seen so tall a woman. Her shoes were white, studded with pearls and with a square gold buckle. They were edged by very tiny roses of all colours. Her dress was also white and sewn with pearls and fell from her throat to her feet. Its sleeves were long and wide and completely hid her crossed hands. From her waist hung what the children described as a long apron of shimmering gold, unadorned by any pattern or gems. Around her shoulders was a white shawl edged, like her shoes, with roses of every colour. She word two gold chains: one, of large, flat six-sided links, was just above the border of her shawl; the other was round her neck and supported a crucifix nearly ten inches ling with the figure of Christ outshining in brilliance everything else about her. One the left arm of the Cross was a hammer, on the right a pair of pincers. Upon her head was something the children called a bonnet, but, from their description, it sees that we should call it a crown, a diadem or a tiara. It was some eight inches high and seemed to be made of light. A garland of roses circled its base where it met her head. Shafts of light sprang from these roses.

The whole effect of the Lady was one of crystalline light. The children could see through her, could see the grass and land behind her, and she was ringed by a broad aureole of almost blinding light close to her body. Beyond that was a second aureole, softer and less dazzling, which also enveloped the children. They noticed that neither they nor the Lady cast a shadow.

As a man, Maximin (later) wrote: “There was nothing in her dress that belonged to earth. It was all of light, but a light quite different from any other.”

At no time during the apparition's stay could Maximin see her face. It was not veiled, but its brightness blinded him. Mélanie, however, saw it, but all she could say of it was that is was “very pretty”.

Throughout the meeting, the Lady wept. Mélanie said: “She wept all the time she spoke to us. I clearly saw the tears flowing.” These tears fell as far as hew knees where they melted and disappeared into the enveloping light. With these tears in mind, it is well to note that the day, September 19, 1846, was an Ember Day, a day of penitence, and, before the reform of the breviary by Blessed Pius X, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin was celebrated on the third Sunday in September. So, on that particular Sunday, priest and religious had on their lips the words of the office at the first Vespers: “O Virgin, daughter of Sion, they sorrow is as great as the ocean ...what floods of tears the Virgin Mother sheds and how great is the grief that pierces her heart.” Throughout the day, as the sun drove westwards, these words were going up from cathedrals, basilicas, parish churches, from monastery choirs and convent chapels, from Pope and village curé, from abbot and novice. In every continent and country, the sorrows of the Mother of God were being recounted, but on this lonely mountain in France two children saw her tears.

They did not understand them. After her last few words, Mélanie thought she was a woman crying because her husband wanted to beat and kill their children. Maximin was sure it was a woman who had taken to the mountains to escape the violence of her son.

And now to what the Beautiful Lady said. As we have seen, her first words were:

“Come nearer, my children. Don't be afraid. I have come to give you important news.”

She went on: “If my people will not submit I shall be compelled to let go the arm of my Son. It is so heavy and so powerful that I can no longer sustain it.

For how long have I suffered on your behalf!

If I do not want my Son to abandon you, I must pray to Him ceaselessly, though you take no account of it.

Pray as much as you like, do as much as you like, but you will never be able to repay me for the trouble I have taken over you.

I have given you six days in which to work. I have reserved the seventh for Myself and yet you do not wish to let Me have it. (Observation: it is apparent Our Lady is quoting a message from Our Lord.)

The carters never swear without using the name of my Son.

These are the two things which are weighing down so heavily the arm of my Son.

If the harvest is spoilt, it is only because of you. Last year, I showed you this in the potato crop, but you took no notice. On the contrary, when you saw the spoilt potatoes, you swore, using the name of my Son. The potatoes will go on rotting and, by Christmas this year, there will be none.”


The children did not understand her. Mélanie could not grasp what what pommes de terre (potatoes) meant. The only pommes she knew grew on apple trees. She looked puzzled and turned to Maximin to see if he could explain.

The Lady checked her.

“Can't you understand, my children? I will tell you in different words.”

And she repeated the message about the harvest in the local patois, speaking it as easily as if she had been born and bred in the district. She continued, still using the patois.

“If you have wheat, do not sow it, for pests will devour all that you sow, and any of it that ripens will fall to dust when it is threshed.

A great famine will come.

Before it comes, little children under seven will be seized with a palsy and will die in the arms of those carrying them. The rest of the people will suffer their penance through the famine.

The nuts will be grub-ridden and the grapes will rot.”

At this point, Mélanie ceased to hear the Lady's voice, although she saw her lips move and Maximin listening with great attention. Then she heard the voice again, but it was silent for Maximin. As she spoke to Mélanie, Maximin behaved like a bored child, taking off his hat and twirling it round on the end of his stick, or flicking the pebbles at his feet with the stick and sending them rolling to the feet of the Lady.

The voice resumed for the both of them:

“If the people change their hearts, the stones and the rock will turn into heaps of wheat and the fields will now themselves with potatoes.

Do you say your prayers well, my children?”

They both answered: “Hardly at all.”

“Ah, my children, you must say at least an Our Father and a Hail Mary. When you can, say more.
During the summer, only a few elderly women go to Mass. The rest of the people work in the fields throughout Sunday in the summer. In the winter, when they have nothing to do, they go to Mass only to jeer at religion. And in Lent, they go to the butchers as if they were dogs.”


(OBSERVATIONS: note this was said during a period after France had just suffered the masonic-influenced anti-Catholic French Revolution, which had decimated piety and religious observance among the populace. Around this time The Curé of Ars also turned his irreligious and spiritually decimated parish of Ars into a spiritual haven, which he accomplished through a lifetime of heroic efforts of austere sacrifice and penance, battling against the very vices of the morally decrepit populace mentioned by Our Lady above.)

Our Lady: “Have you ever seen spoilt wheat, my children?”

They both said they had not.

She turned to Maximin.

“But my child, you certainly saw it once – when you went with your father to Coin (a hamlet near Corps). There was a man there who asked your father to go with him and see his ruined wheat. He went, took two or three of the ears of wheat and rubbed them in his hand. They crumbled to dust. On your way back, when you were still half-an-hour's walk from Corps, your father gave you a bit of bread and said 'Here child, you can still eat bread this year, but, if things go on like this, we don't know who will eat it next year.'”

“That's right, Madame,” exclaimed Maximin. “I didn't remember it as first, but I do now.” He remembered going to Coin with his father to buy an ash-tree- Everything had happened as the Lady said. Now came her final words:

“Well, my children, spread this message among all my people.”

She spoke this in French, and them moved forward, Maximin stepping aside to let her pass. She crossed the Spezia, brushing a great stone which had been rolled into the stream to make an easy crossing-place when the water was high with the melting snows. After she had gone a few yards, she spoke again without turning around, repeating with a little more emphasis her final word to the children:

“Be sure. My children, to spread this message among all my people.”

The children began to follow her. The side of the valley had two parallel paths up to the top. Half-way up, a third tack crossed them. She used them all, tracing a wide S which, it was afterwards discovered, was in shape a reproduction in miniature of the Way of the Cross.

(OBSERVATIONS: of interest, this detail was confirmed again by Our Lady Herself to the mystic Marie-Julie Jahenny November 29, 1877 saying she traced the Way of the Cross on the mountain of La Salette.)


The children noticed her feet did not touch the grass. Maximin said: “She moved as though she hung above the ground and someone were pushing her.” Just before she reached the top of the slope, she stopped and rose some four or five feet in the air, remaining there for about half a minute. She raised her eyes to the sky and then looked towards the distant horizon away to the south-east the direction of Italy and Rome. She no longer wept but her expression was one of great sadness.

She began to disappear, to 'melt' as the children said, starting with her head which, quickly followed by the rest of her, was veiled by the same brilliant light which heralded her appearance.

It was then the children first realised they had not been talking with a fellow human being.

“Perhaps she is a great saint,” Mélanie said. And Maximin answered: “If we had known that she was, we would have asked her to take us with her.” As he spoke, all that remained visible of the Lady was her shoes and he jumped forward to grab one of the roses decorating them. But his hand caught only emptiness. Mélanie told him: “She does not want to be seen so that we shall not be able to watch where she goes.”

The globe of light which had absorbed the Lady stayed for a few seconds and then it faded into the light of common day.

They went back to the Little Spring to collect their satchels. The dog, Loulou, was still there, asleep with his muzzle on his paws, just as he had been during the whole time of the apparition. The children remembered that he had not barked at the stranger, which he certainly would have done had the Lady been of flesh and blood. Accompanied by the dog, they returned to the cows, still grazing peacefully where they had left them, and they saw again the three children who had joined them earlier at the People's Spring. This time they did not speak to them, but they spoke to each other about the Lady. Maximin said: “She once stopped speaking, although I saw her lips were still moving. What was she saying?” She told me something,” Mélanie replied, “but I don't want to tell you what is was, she forbade me to.” “Oh, that's all right, Mélanie. She also told me something, and I don't want to tell you about it either.”

It was time to being the journey back to La Salette. Pierre Selme had finished his work and left, not worrying about Maximin since he was with Mélanie whom he knew to be trustworthy.

So, in the mellow light of that autumn evening, the children drove their cows down the mountain, chattering as they went, interested in their experience but very far from realising its significance, totally unaware that their future had been transformed, that there were was no longer of any question of their spending their lives in the hard humble way of peasants, quite unable to see, however dimly, that they were now different and set apart from all their companions; nor were they to know that, once they had spoken of what they had seen and heard they would set into motion great events, that they and their story would become the cause of bitter controversy (…) .

(End of the Excerpt from 'The Sun Her Mantle').

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


PART TWO: THE RELUCTANCE TO REVEAL THE SECRETS –

As we have seen from the account above, there was one part during the apparition when Our Lady spoke with each seer privately, one child not hearing what the other was told. Of interest, we see that they were not supposed to reveal even to each other their given Secret.

The children admitted they were told by the Lady not to reveal their individual Secrets.

For the first five years after the Apparition, the children remained true to this order.

When interrogated about the secrets, even bribed, threatened and cajoled to reveal them – Maximin and Mélanie were adamant in keeping their secrets at all cos

I am including several interrogations that different members of the clergy conducted as recounted in 'The Sun Her Mantle' to show how adamant the children where in not revealing them:


+ + +


(From the 'Sun Her Mantle', pp. 45-53)


“In January, 1847, a priest, the Abbé Lagier came to Corps to stay with his father who was dying. During the time he was there, he questioned Mélanie and Maximin with great thoroughness. He enjoyed some advantages that other inquisitors lacked. A native of Corps, he spoke the local patois, he was in no hurry and he came in winter when the throngs of curious spring and summer visitors had gone. He spent one session with Maximin and three of nearly five hours each with Mélanie. He wrote down what they said as they said it. He declared: 'I wished only to discover the truth and so I had only one aim: to report my interrogations in exactly the same words as were used without worrying about repeating myself or being too diffuse.'

He questioned them closely about the actual physical facts of the Apparition, but turned all his guns on Mélanie in an effort to get her to tell him the secret message given her by the Lady. A translation of part of this interrogation will show the kind of ordeal to which the children were submitted.

The Abbé Lagier began:

(Abbé Lagier) “Did it never enter your head to kneel down?” (Before the Lady.)

(Mélanie): “Oh! No!” (Mélanie smiled as she replied.)

“Now you're going to tell me what she said to you.”

(Mélanie smiled again.) “Oh! No.”

“You could tell it easily to a priest you know, a priest of your own church.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because ...”

“Come, why not?”

“Oh! No.”

“You could tell it easily to a priest who knows hot to keep a secret. Your secret can very easily be kept by a priest who is told all kinds of secrets and who is bound by conscience to preserve them. It seems to me that if she was the Blessed Virgin, she would not have forbidden you to tell it to priests – to other people, yes, but not to priests. I can't see any reason preventing you from telling them. Besides, you are still very young and you need advice. Many people could be told your secret and keep it safe – priests whom you trust or some other decent, trustworthy person, say your father or mother.”

“No. I will not talk about it.”

“Not to anyone?”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“Not to someone who is discreet?”

“Discreet or not, I don't want to talk about it.”

“You can ….”

“No, I won't.”

“Why not?”

“I don't want to.”

“Do you think that if you did tell it, it would not be kept absolutely safe?”

“Even if it were quite safe, I don't want to tell it.”

“Why not?”

“Because I was forbidden to tell it and I don't want to tell it and I shall never tell it.”

“Is this secret about Heaven or Hell?”

“It's about what it is about; if I told you, you would know it and I don't want to tell it.”

“But without saying what it is, you could quite well tell me if it is about religion or something else.”

“No matter what it's about, I don't want to tell it.”

“Very well, since you don't want to tell me, I shan't ask you any more about it. It obviously concerns only you.”

The Abbé Lagier pretended to sharpen his pencil and said:

“I should be glad if it concerned me, me and other priests. I should then feel happy at having come here in spite of my father's illness.”

Mélanie did not speak. She bent her head.

“You're not going to say anything?”

She looked up, smiled ans asked:

“What do you want me to say?”

“Look, Mélanie, I must say this too you: If you were asked to tell your Secret to the Bishop, who is the successor of the Apostles, and by the Supreme Pontiff, who is the successor of Jesus Christ, I've enough confidence in you to believe that you could tell them.”

“Oh! No.” (Lagier notes that Mélanie said this with 'astonishing assurance'.)

“What!”

“No! No! I should not speak.” (Lagier says: Í trembles at the assurance of these words.´)

“Listen, my child. What you have just said bewilders me. I can hardly explain what I feel. I just don't know what to think when I hear you say that you would not tell your secret even to my Bishop, a saintly man consecrated to God, or to our Holy Father, the Pope, the representative on earth of Jesus Christ. Why, I would tell them everything that I have done or thought, all the things it would be hardest for me to say to anyone else in the world. It would not trouble me to tell them of my worst faults.”

Mélanie stopped him and said:

“Yes, so would I. I would tell them those things, but not this.”

“In this case, my poor Mélanie, it must have been the devil you saw and not the Blessed Virgin, since if the Blessed Virgin forbade you to tell the secret to priests it would mean that she had no respect for the priests of the religion of her Son.” Lagier then paused and asked: “Are you hurt by what I just said?”

“No.”

“Are you certain?”

“Yes. Why should I be hurt?”

The questioning continued, but in the end the Abbé Lagier was glad to admit defeat.

“Yes, Mélanie, you must not tell your secret – not to anyone. Since she has forbidden it, you must die rather than tell it.”

Mélanie said nothing. Lagier asked:

“Would you suffer, would you die rather than tell it?”

“Yes.”

“Because she ordered you to die rather than reveal it?”

Lagier says: “The child was silent and I stopped, feeling it was quite enough to have tormented her with the same question for three hours.”

Maximin was equally resolute in defending the secret of the message given to him. Here are some of the things said to him by various people and his answers.

“You want to be a priest. Very well. Tell me your secret and I will look after you. I'll write to the Bishop who will see that you pay nothing for your education.”

Maximin: “If I have to tell my secret to be a priest, then I will never be one.”

“You must reveal your secret to a priest when you confess, for you must hide nothing from him.”

Maximin: “My secret is not a sin, and at confession we have only to tell out sins.”

“What if you forget the secret?”

Maximin: “God could make me remember it again if He wanted.”

“But if He didn't want to, your secret would be lost.”

Maximin: “That's nothing to do with me. God will tell it to someone else if He wishes.”

“What if you had either to tell you secret or die?”

Maximin: “I should die. I should not tell.”

(…)

A priest who talked with them three months after the apparition wrote to the Bishop of Grenoble: ´They know nothing. They don't even know the great truths of religion, yet when they speak about Our Lady they are little Doctors. No matter what one says, whether to intimidate or confute them, they answer in a way which both baffles and disarms one.´

Perhaps the most important witness in this quality in the two children is the Abbé Dupanloup. He was made Bishop of Orléans at the end of 1849. The year before, in June, he arrived in La Salette. He was then superior of the seminary at Chardonnet and, aged forty-six, was at the height of his powers, a man of wide experience, clear judgement and much learning. He came to La Salette prejudiced in advance against the story, for all the accounts of it which he had read struck him as far too enthusiastic and uncritical. Each year he stayed with friends on their estate near Grenoble and it was they who urged him to try to get to the truth of the matter.

(:..)

Like the Abbé Lagier he (i.e. Abbé Dupanloup), was profoundly impressed by the tenacity with which they held on to their secrets. He tells how he tried to break down Maximin's resistance. He had a valise which he opened and locked by a secret device. Maximin´s curiosity was aroused by this. He demanded to be shown how it worked.

“It is my secret,” said the Abbé Dupanloup. “You refuse to tell me yours, so I shall not tell you mine.”

“It's not the same thing.”

“Why?”

“Because I have been forbidden to speak about my secret. No one has said you must not tell yours.”

The Abbé Dupanloup was not to be moved. From time to time, he opened and shut his valise, taking care that Maximin did not see how he did it. Time and time again, Maximin tried to persuade him to tell.

“I should like to very much,” the Abbé said; “but you must tell me your secret if I do.”

At this, all Maximin's curiosity vanished. But, after a time, he returned to the attack, got the same answer and reacted in the same way. Finally the Abbé said; “Well, at least, as you want to know my secret, tell me something of yours. I'm not asking you to tell me all of it, but only to tell if it is something pleasant or unpleasant. That's won't be telling me your secret.”

Maximin said. “I can't.”

Another time, the Abbé tried a new temptation. He put in his purse a handful of gold coins and left it lying in his room when Maximin was due to visit him. The boy, as usual, ferreted around, discovered the purse, tipped the coins onto the table and started playing with them.

The Abbé then said to him: “If you tell me as much of your secret as you feel able to, I will give you this gold for you and your father. You can have it all with a clear conscience, for I have plenty of money for the rest of my journey.”

Until he spoke, Maximin had been completely absorbed in playing with the coins, but the moment he heard this proposal, his face became grace, he jumped up from the table and walked away saying, “I cannot.”

The Abbé assumed a mocking tone: “Perhaps you don't want to tell me your secret because you haven't one. Perhaps it's all a joke.”

Maximin's reply was: “Oh yes, I have one, but I cannot tell you about it.”

“Who has forbidden you?”

“The Blessed Virgin.”

The Abbé Dupanloup says: “I then stopped my useless struggle. I felt that the lad's dignity was more than mine. With friendly respect, I placed my hand on his head and said, 'Goodbye, my dear child. I hope the Blessed Virgin will forgive me for all the tests I've put you through. Be faithful all you life to the grace you have received.' After a few seconds, we parted, never to see each other again.”

(End of the Excerpt from 'The Sun Her Mantle')


:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


OBSERVATIONS: In the beginning as we can see, the children were forbidden by Our Lady to reveal their Secrets and were not even going to tell their local Bishop or even the Pope himself, and were ready to die to keep them private – how were they later convinced to write them down for Pope Pius IX?

According to the book the 'Sun Her Mantle' it was the scandalous 'Incident of Ars' that caused members of the clergy to finally pry the secret from them and have them sent to the Pope order to clear up the scandal and prove the Apparition was either real or fake, once and for all.

Maximin himself confirmed this later to a lady from Nantes named Marie des Brulais in 1851 a year after the incident, saying that his foolishness at Ars caused the secret to eventually be sent to Rome. Marie des Brulais would later publish her interview with Maximin about the incident in the 1852 edition of 'L'Echo de la Sainte Montagne'.


Before I recount the 'Incident of Ars', here is a Recapitulation of a Chronology of Events after the Appearance of the Apparition at this point:



(September 19, 1846) – THE APPARITION of LA SALETTE OCCURS

(September 1846) – Bishop Mgr Philibert de Bruillard of Grenoble begins the official inquiry into the phenomenon and sets up two commission to investigate: one made up of the cathedral canons, the other of professors from the Grand Séminaire

(Summer of 1847) – Bishop Bruillard tasks Canon Rousselot, professor of Theology at the Grand Séminaire, and Canon Orcel, the Superior there, to investigate the matter.

(October 1847) – the two Canons draw up their report, and the Bishop establishes another commission to investigate – 20 cases of healings were considered, and at last the commission declared themselves convinced of the truth of the apparition. Bishop Bruillard relaxes a little of the his restrictions on the clergy and permitted them to them accompany pilgrims to the site. The Bishop also gave permission for Canon Rousselot to publish a book on La Salette entitled “The Truth about the Happening at La Salette” based on his and Canon Orcel's original investigations.

However, the formal approval of the apparition was in preparation, t

(September 1850) - The Scandalous 'Incident of Ars' occurs – which nearly threatens the proceedings.


:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


PART THREE: THE SCANDALOUS INCIDENT of ARS Maximin, while in a foul mood, either intentionally or unintentionally, casts discredit on the Apparition and fools St. John Marie Vianney, the Curé of Ars, into thinking it was a hoax – he believed this for several years


I will use several sources here to piece the event together; (1) the 'Sun Her Mantle', (2) the account of the incident as found in the 'The Curé of Ars: St. Jean Baptise Marie Vianney', by Abbé Francis Trochu, (TAN Publishers, 1977. Reprinted from the 1927 Burns & Oates and Washbourne edition), and, (3) the Interview with Maximin published in 'L´Echo de the Sainte Montagne', by Marie Des Brulais in 1852.

As usual, any personal observations or clarifications made by me will be indicated with OBSERVATIONS / NOTES, etc. in capitals.

::::::::::::::::::


(NOTE: To place the Incident in Context - the Vicaire, or pastoral assistant of the Curé of Ars, Abbé Raymond, became prejudiced against La Salette and objected to the Curé of Ars blessing and handing out medals and holy water from La Salette. His prejudice against La Salette would later influence events at Ars).

Excerpt from the 'Curé of Ars, pp. 378-379:


:::::::

Excerpt from the 'Sun Her Mantle', pages 56 -58:

(NOTE: Starting from the point where The Curé of Ars´ pastoral assistant, Abbé Raymond, was prejudiced against La Salette from the beginning):

“The Curé's vicaire, Abbé Raymond, did not believe in La Salette. He had made the pilgrimage to the mountain and had met Maximin there. They boy's manner had antagonised him and he was violently prejudiced against the whole business.

Maximin had no business to go to Ars for, in leaving the diocese of Grenoble, he was going against the wishes of his Bishop. But, in the Spring of 1859, Maximin was a boy of fifteen, sick to death of lessons and living with nuns.

(NOTE: after the apparition he had been sent to a school to be educated by nuns.)

(Maximin) made several attempts to escape from the school room, once going to Ablandins and offering to work for Baptiste Pra. Each time he was brought back, but after the last escapade he went to live with his uncle – his father had died the year before. Yet he still felt himself a prisoner, for a tutor was engaged who worked him hard and kept strict guard over him.

Towards the end of August, a Marist priest, Father Bonnefous, arrived in Corps. He was a fervent believer in La Salette, but unfortunately he also believed he had been chosen to do great thing with Maximin. He suggested to him that he should go to Lyons to continue his studies with the Marist Fathers there. Maximin had no great wish to study anywhere, but he was overjoyed at the thought of going to Lyons, so Father Bonnefous returned there to see if the Fathers were willing to accept Maximin as their pupil. A month later, he was back in Corps with the news that the Fathers were agreeable although they could not waive all the school fees.

Then stepped forward Monsieur Houzelot, who sold ecclesiastical jewellery and metalwork in Paris, Monsieur Verrier, a business-man from Baen, and Monsieur Brayer – all three of them devout believers in the truth of L Salette. They offered to share all the expense of sending Maximin to Lyons. This was an act of genuine charity, but – perhaps unconsciously- they were stirred by another motive. At this time, the Baron de Richmont was claiming to be Louis XVII and his many partisans included these three. They believed that the secrets given to the children concerned the Baron and hoped that testimony from La Salette would give a great fillip to the cause. Monsieur Houzelot was a little shaken when he showed Maximin a small portrait of the Baron de Richmont and asked him if he had ever heard of Louis XVII and got the reply that Maximin knew of only one Louis – Louis Philippe and about him very little. But the three men were not daunted by this ignorance. They felt that Maximin was a politically valuable asset to their cause and must be treated with kindness and generosity. They also decided that Maximin must go to see the Curé d'Ars, apparently in the hope that the saintly priest would be able to extract the secret. The reason given for the trip to Ars was that Maximin was to consult the Curé about his vocation. It certainly was one reason, but behind it was this other one, this political one.

Maximin was willing to go anywhere to get away from Corps and he enthusiastically agreed to go to Ars. His uncle gave him permission to be away for one week, and on, September 22, Maximin accompanied by Brayer and Verrier, set off from Corps. They spent the night in Grenoble. Next morning, the Bishop sent a message to Maximin forbidding him to leave the diocese, but in the evening the party took the coach to Lyons.”

(OBSERVATION: Note the lack of OBEDIENCE to the Bishop – no doubt the devil was given a foothold at this point to cause havoc.)

Continuation of the excerpt:

“Thy had been joined by Maximin's sister, Angélique, and the four of them arrived at Ars at about half-past six on the evening of September 24, The Curé was saying his Office, so they say the Abbé Raymond who took them to the Providence, the orphanage for girls established by the Curé years before. There they demanded to know the reason which had brought Maximin to Ars. He was told it was because the boy wanted to get from the Curé useful advice about his future, whereupon the Abbé Raymond said: ´But how can he be uncertain about his future if he has seen the Blessed Virgin if she has spoken to him, if she has confided a secret to him?´ And he immediately launched into a bitter diatribe against La Salette. Turning to Maximin he said: ´See here, Maximin, if you still have the audacity to claim that you have seen the Blessed Virgin, you are a liar.´ Maximin replied: “I have never said that I saw the Blessed Virgin. All I've said was that I saw a beautiful Lady. But say, if you want to, that I'm a liar. Why should I care?'.
The Abbé´s final words that evening were: ´La Salette must be smashed. The lad is lying.´ Before he slept, he told the Curé of Ars that Maximin had stated he had never seen the Blessed Virgin.
Next morning Maximin and his companions arrived at the church about nine o´clock. Maximin knelt before the Curé and talked with him for a few minutes. He was greeted with the words: ´So you are the one who has seen the Blessed Virgin?' In what tone they were said we do not know, but it was not the happiest approach after M. Raymond´s accusations of the preceding night. It is not certain what was Maximin´s reply, but the old priest and the boy stayed talking for a short time. (…) (Maximin) said the Curé had advised him to return to Grenoble and put himself at the Bishop´s disposal and he was taken back to the church for another interview.
Later that day and during the next, the Curé declared: 'Maximin has seen nothing, if what he says is true … if he has told me the truth, he has not seen the Blessed Virgin.” And from that moment he no longer autographed pictures or blessed medals of La Salette.”

:::::

WHAT HAPPENED?

The Curé of Ars insisted he had made no misjudgement of Maximin. The Curé of Ars recounted the following to a priest named Abbé des Garets, as well as another priest:

“One cannot believe in La Salette if what the lad said to be true. He told me: ´I have not seen the Blessed Virgin, but it has done nobody any harm. I want to make a general confession and enter a monastery. 'My child,' I said, ´if you have lied, you must retract your lies.´ `Oh, it's not necessary,´ Maximin said, ´they've not hurt anyone, and some people have even been converted by them. And when once I'm in a monastery, I shall say that I have told everything and have nothing more to say.´ ´My friend,´I said, ´I cannot take the responsibility of this on myself. I must consult my Bishop. ´Very well, consult him!´ The Curé telling this, added: ´People say that I was deaf, but I heard him clearly.´.” (The Sun Her Mantle, p. 63)


According to the Abbé Champon, who became Maximin's tutor from October 1853 and March 1856, he said Maximin admitted to him and his sister:“I had heard that the Curé of Ars read the secrets of one´s conscience and I wanted to make sure of this myself. So I confessed to him and said that everything I had recounted about the apparition of the Blessed Virgin was untrue and that I had seen nothing. The Curé of Ars believed me, and so he can't read one's conscience – he's like everyone else.” (The Sun Her Mantle, pp. 63-64)

The author of the 'Sun Her Mantle' notes we have to take into account this admittance from Maximin came from a roundabout way, it was told years after the event by Abbé Champon's sister who in turn related the event to a canon, who then later repeated it to Monseigneur Giray in 1917, which would be sixty one years afterwards. But it is one account that explains why the Curé was so adamant that Maximin had said he lied and had not seen anything, and continually affirmed he understood what the youth said, he was not deaf as claimed, however, Maximin contradicts this in a written defence he wrote in November of 1850 right after the Scandal occurred in Ars, and, after he was brought before a tribunal of priests and laymen presided over by the Bishop and heavily questioned about the affair in October. (He must have then realised how damaging his little escapade in Ars was):

“I, Maximin Giraud, state the following facts to pay homage to the truth and for the greater glory of God and in honour of the Blessed Virgin:

1, I did not confess to the Curé of Ars.
2, Neither in the sacristy nor behind the altar of the church at Ars did the Curé question me about the apparition or about my secret. He said only things to me: that I should go back to my diocese and that I ought to be very virtuous after such a grace.
3, In anything I said to the Curé of Ars or to Monsieur Raymond, I said nothing contrary to what I have said to thousands of other people since September 19, 1846.
4, I have never said my secret was about Louis XVII.
5, I take back nothing of what I have said to the Bishop of Grenoble and to so many others about the happening at La Salette. I am ready to swear to all this on oath.” (The Sun her Mantle, pp. 60-61).

Despite this declaration, the Curé of Ars repeated again what Maximin told him, and so Maximin wrote a letter to the Curé in which he once more insisted it is he who must have misunderstood him, and continued to misunderstand him, adding: “I never meant to say to you, nor have I ever seriously said to anyone else that I saw nothing and that I had lied in making my story known, and that I persisted in my lies for three years because of the effect they had. When I left the sacristy, I said to you at the door – and I said nothing else –that I had seen something and that I did not know if it was the Blessed Virgin or another lady. Then you stepped forward into the crowd and that was the end of our talk.” (The Sun Her Mantle, pp. 61-62)

So, the Curé heard one thing, while Maximin continued to insist he never said what the venerable priest was claiming he said.

As stated earlier, we also have another account from Maximin himself dated 1851 and published in 1852 when he explains the 'lies' he told the Curé of Ars referred to the little schoolboy lies he told when he didn't want to say where he had run off to when skipping his lessons or, when he didn't do his school work. The Curé of Ars assumed he meant he was lying about the apparition at La Salette, but he assumed the wrong thing, and Maximin left him continue to assume that at the time.


From Mademoiselle Marie des Brulais of Nantes – her interview with Maximin in September 27, 1851 about the Incident at Ars, published in the 1852 edition of 'L´Echo de la Sainte Montagne (pp. 230-231) :

QUESTION: “Why, child, did you surrender yourself into their hands?” (I.e. the three political intriguers who took him to Ars in the first place.)
ANSWER: “Hey! To see the country ...”
Q: “What a road you were entering upon, you poor, imprudent child! What were you thinking of?”
A: “Ah! I have been very foolish, it is true; but all the same, it is that which marched the Secret to Rome!
Q: “How so?”
A: “Well! you will see: Mgr the Cardinal knew all the noise which they made in the newspapers because of the Curé of Ars, and then, he wanted to have the Secret. The Pope asked for it, and the Bishop of Grenoble sent it to the Pope: there you go.
Q: “But what happened to the Curé of Ars? Will you tell me something about it?”
A. “Here: These three gentlemen took me to the Curé of Ars to have me consult him, as they said, on my vocation. M. le Curé advised me to return to my diocese; and these gentlemen were very angry about it: they told me that I had misunderstood and they sent me back to him. I went to his confessional, since we hardly speak to him except there. The Curé of Ars is almost deaf and you can't hear him too well, because he's missing a lot of teeth. He asked me if I had seen the Blessed Virgin and I answered him: I do not know if it is the Blessed Virgin; I saw something ... a Lady ... But if you know that it is the Blessed Virgin, you have to tell all these people, so that they believe in La Salette.”
Q: “They assure, my dear child, that you accused yourself to the Curé of Ars for having told lies: is it true?”
A. “Ah! I said that I had sometimes told M. le Curé de Corps lies. "You must retract," said the Curé of Ars to me. - No, I replied, I cannot retract for that: it is not worth it. - He told me I had to; and I replied: Since it's over, I can't anymore: it's too old ... -
Q. “But what did you mean?”-
A. (Said with confidence.) I meant my little lies to M. le Curé de Corps, when I did not want to tell him where I was going or that I did not want to study my lessons.”
Q. “So I see that the Curé of Ars understood that these lies you were talking to him about were related to the Apparition?”
A. “Yes! he understood like that, at least that is what has been written in the newspapers.”
Q. “But you did not confess?”
A. “No. I was in the confessional, but I had not said my Confiteor and I had not gone there to confess.”
Q. “They add that you retracted in front of the Vicar of Ars?” (NOTE: this is Abbé Raymond.)
A: “Not at all!”
Q. “What did the Vicar say to you?
A. “Ah! he said that I had made a story and that I had not seen the Blessed Virgin; then I was not in a very good mood, I said to him: ´'Put it if you want that I have told lies and have seen nothing.'. After that, I walked away.

(End of Quote)

NOTE-What to make of this? Basically, Maximin angrily replied to Abbé Raymond's curt accusations he could call him a liar if he wanted as he didn't care what Abbé Raymond, thought but it was taken out of context by the Abbé who continued to believe Maximin was lying about La Salette. And, as a result, he was the first one to say to the Curé that Maximin was lying about the apparition and therefore has set the foundation for the Curé's first impressions.

Then, we have an account from Maximin in that he let the Curé assume he was lying about La Salette, when he was really talking about a completely different set of circumstances regarding his school days and the lies he told then which had nothing to do with the apparition.

Maximin said he did tell the Curé at the end of their meeting he saw 'something', a 'beautiful lady', but it is possible the ambiguity left about his 'school day lies' is what lingered, and this is what the Curé remembered. Why Maximin did not take more care to clarify things right away we may never know, but if the anecdote from Abbé Champon quoted above about Maximin wanting to test the Curé´s gift of reading consciences has any validity, perhaps it was true Maximin wanted to test him and purposely left this ambiguity about lying in order to do so, and, may even have lied and said he saw nothing to test him further, unaware of the serious backlash this would cause and eventually confessed years later to his tutor about what he had said. We note that he wrote in his public explanation of the event to the Curé of Ars that "I never meant to say to you, nor have I ever seriously said to anyone else that I saw nothing and that I had lied in making my story known.”

In other words, he didn't mean what he said, and, it was not to be taken seriously (if he did lie and said he saw nothing at La Salette to test the Curé), but the damage was done.


Then, we have to take into account another explanation: Maximin also said he could hardly understand the Curé when speaking due to his lack of teeth, and said he was forced to answer 'yes' or 'no' to his questions, not knowing what he was really saying, and as a result, not knowing to what he was assenting or denying. So, it could also have been a misunderstanding from all sides. Perhaps we will never fully know what happened.

We do know Maximin said: “The Curé had the devil in his ear when I spoke to him.” To which it was said to him: “And you had the devil on your tongue.” The author of 'The Sun her Mantle' writes that Maximin laughed in agreement. (p. 64).

::::::::::

The Aftermath:

This torment The Curé of Ars felt over La Salette continued for several years right up until October 1858 when for two weeks in particular he felt like his soul was literally being dragged over a rough road. He finally begged God to given him a sign, no doubt a sign confirming it was indeed a real apparition, and at once felt peace. He then desired to see a priest from Grenoble in order to tell him what had just interiorly happened with him. His desire was granted when the very next day on October 11 when the parish priest of the cathedral of Grenoble came and asked what he thought of La Salette. The Curé said 'I think that one can and that one should believe it.' Then, after praying to Our Lady of La Salette for help in raising a sum of money he needed to fund a mission, that very evening before he went to bed, the Curé found the bedside table covered in gold coins. He gathered them up and went to bed. He got up the next morning, the table was covered with gold coins once more. He took all these events as a sign and said: “Don't you think that after that I should believe in La Salette?”


::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


PART FOUR: THE PLAN TO HAVE THE SECRETS WRITTEN FOR THE POPE


Maximin was correct in that his visit to Ars and what happened there was an act of his foolishness, but it did bring about one good effect – it forced the two seers to send a copy of their secrets to the Pope.

The first person to set the wheel rolling in that direction was Abbé Raymond who still determined to quash La Salette, and he wrote to the Archbishop of Lyons, Cardinal de Bonald, who also did not believe in La Salette, and told him his version of the events at Ars. Upon hearing about the scandal at Ars, the Archbishop was determined to put an end to the 'fake' apparition of La Salette through demanding to know what was in the Secrets. Either the children had no secrets, or, the absurdity of the contents would prove that La Salette was indeed a false apparition.

As the author of the 'Sun Her Mantle' points out, the Archbishop of Lyons knew better than to simply go over the head of the Bishop of Grenoble and and arranged all accordingly so it would be sheltered behind the authority of the Pope.

Early 1851, he secured assistance from Cardinal Gousset, the Archbishop of Rheims, who was currently staying in Lyons on his way to Rome. Cardinal Gousset agreed to ask the Pope to send the Secrets via him through the Archbishop of Lyons.

Pope Pius IX indeed gave the order, and so the Archbishop of Lyons sent the official request, at first under the guise of asking if the seers were willing to tell their secrets so they can be sent to the Pope. No doubt this was a test: it had been duly noted they children had been adamant on not revealing anything, but would they refuse an official order from the Pope if he gave it? The request could not be disregarded and so Canon Auvergene was sent to interview Maximin to receive his response:

(Excerpts from the 'Sun Her Mantle', pp. 67-71)

Canon Auvergene: “Maximin, I'm going to speak to you about an important matter. Promise not to repeat what I am going to say to you.”
Maximin: “Yes, Monsieur.”
“Can the Church make a mistake?”
“No, Monsieur.”
“Can the Pope, the Vicar of Christ, make a mistake when he speaks in the name of the Church?”
“No, Monsieur.
“So if the Pope asks you for your secret, you will tell it to him.”
“I am not in the presence of the Pope. When I am, I shall see about it.”
“What do you mean – you'll see about it? Do you mean that if he orders you to tell him you secret, you'll refuse to tell him?”
“If he orders me to, I shall tell him.”
“Well, my child, I'm happy to see you in such a good frame of mind. I am going to Corenc straight away to see Mélanie and find out if she feels like you about telling her secret to the Pope if he orders her to.
Canon Auvergne went off to Corenc where he found Mélanie reluctant to discuss her secret. Over and over again she said: “The Blessed Virgin has forbidden me to speak of it.” “But Mélanie,” the Canon insisted, “the Church needs to know your secret so be sure of the truth of La Salette. Surely you will tell it at the orders of the Pope?” But all the Mélanie would say was: “I will tell it only to him and no one else must know what I say.” She refused to send her secret to the Pope through any bishop or archbishop.
Five days later M. Rousselot took the road to Corenc to see what he could do to persuade Mélanie.
(M. Rousselot): “If the Sovereign Pontiff command you to tell him your secret, will you obey?”
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“You will tell him willingly?”
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“And you will tell it without any fear of offending the Blessed Virgin?”
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“So if the Pope order you to give you secret to someone whom he has chosen to receive it and forward it to him, will you tell it to this person?”
“No, Monsieur, I want to tell it only to the Pope and only when he orders it.”
“But if the Pope demands to know your secret, how will you let him have it?”
“I shall tell him in person, or I shall write it for him in a sealed letter.”
“And who will you get to send this sealed letter to the Pope?”
“Monseigneur the Bishop.”
“Won't you send it by anyone else?”
“I will send it either by Monseigneur or by you.”
“Won't you send it to the Pope by the Archbishop of Lyons?”
“No, Monsieur.”
“Nor by any other priest?”
“No, Monsieur.”
“Why not?”
“Because there is not much belief in La Salette at Lyons. Besides, I don't want anyone to unseal my letter.”
“When the Pope knows what your secret is, will you be upset if he publishes it?”
“No, Monsieur. That will be his affair.”

The Archbishop of Lyons had met his match in Mélanie. An account of these conversations with the children was sent to him but two months had passed without any reply, so the Bishop of Grenoble wrote to the Pope and sent him the same account of the conversations. Word came from Rome that the Pope, Pius IX, would accept the secrets through Monseigneur de Bruillard.

On July 2, an emissary of the Bishop, M. Dausse, brought Maximin to the episcopal palace. (NOTE: Benjamin Dausse was a prominent and pious layman of Grenoble who enjoyed the complete confidence of Bishop Bruillard) On the way there, Maximin chattered away in his usual lively manner. M. Dausse tried to make him realise the seriousness of what he was about to do. “You must think of what you are going to write. Try hard to remember every word of your secret so that you will leave nothing out.” Maximin replied: “Oh, I'm not worried. I remember all of it perfectly. You see – I shall write it down quickly without having to think.”

Arriving at the palace, Maximin was taken to a room on the second floor overlooking the Place Notre-Dame and placed at a desk. The Bishop summoned a canon, M. De Taxis, and ordered him stay with M Dausse and keep watch over Maximin until he had finished writing. He then left the room.

Maximin put his head in his hands for a few seconds, dipped his pen in the ink pot and shook it on the parquet floor. “Where do you think you are – in an old shed?” snapped M. Taxis. Maximin glanced at the ink splattered floor, said nothing and began to write. After a little time he showed M. Dausse what he had written. (NOTE: at that point he had written the date of the Apparition of La Salette, what he saw, and declared his following statement was what she told him in the midst of the apparition after the prophecy of the nuts rotting.)

M Dausse told him that what he had written was all right, but the he must now write out the secret.

Maximin returned to the desk, wrote for a short time at great speed, then jumped up, flung the sheet of paper in the air and danced about, crying: “Now I'm like everybody else. No one need come to question me any more. They can go to the Pope and ask him questions. He will answer them if he wants to.” Then he ran to the windows to look in the square outside. The two men picked up the paper from the floor, saw it was covered with blots and ordered Maximin to copy it out again. “Is that how one writes to the Holy Father?” protested M Taxis. When a fair copy was made, the Bishop was told. He came in and, at the insistence of M. Taxis, read the messages to make sure it was not unworthy of being sent to the Pope. Maximin then put the paper in an envelope and the episcopal seal was imposed.

That same evening, M. Dausse and M. Taxis went to Corenc to collect Mélanie's secret. She wept and refused to give it up, but at last said she would write it next day. At eight o'clock in the morning she kept her word. She wrote for an hour, calmly and seriously and without a pause, covering three pages of narrow-lined note-paper. Without reading it through, she placed it in an envelope which she sealed and addressed to: “His Holiness Pius IX in Rome.”

A few hours later, she asked to see M, Rousselot. She told him she had made a mistake in writing that two events would take lace on a certain date. Actually, the events would come at separate dates. M. Rousselot assured her that she would be allowed to rewrite her message. This she did in Grenoble on July 6, at a convent of the Sisters of Providence and in the presence of two witnesses. Once again she wrote steadily, only pausing to ask for the exact meaning of the word 'infallibly' and for the selling of 'corrupt' – she said she was writing 'corrupt cities.´ She also wanted to know how to spell 'anti-Christ'. This second version was sealed up and it was this which was delivered to the Pope. The first remained with the Bishop of Grenoble.

M Rousselot and a companion arrived in Rome on July 11, and a private audience with the Pope was arranged for a week later.

Pius IX welcomed them warmly and then, in their presence, unsealed the messages. He first read that of Maximin. When he had finished, he commented: “It has the frankness and simplicity of a child. He turned to Mélanie´s message. “As he read it, his expression changed. His lips tightened and his cheeks flushed. In a grave voice he said: “I must read these letters again at my leisure. Disasters threaten France, but Germany, Italy and the whole of Europe are guilty and deserve punishment, I am less afraid of open and declared impiety than indifference and respect for convention. It is not without reason that the Church is called militant and you see here its commander.” As he said this, the Pope tapped himself on the breast.

Several years later, the Superior of the Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette was received in private audience by Pius IX and he asked if the secrets could not be disclosed. The Pope replied: “So you want to know the secrets of La Salette? Well, here they are: unless you repent you will all perish.”

(End of Except from the 'Sun her Mantle')


:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

APPROVAL GIVEN AFTER FIVE YEARS OF INVESTIGATIONS.

The Apparitions of Our Lady at La Salette was approved in November 1851 by Bishop Bruillard a few months after the Secrets had been delivered to Bl Pius IX in July 1851.


:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

PART FIVE: The ORIGINAL SECRETS:

:::::::::::::::::::::

MAXIMIN'S FIRST VERSION OF HIS SECRET:

On September 19, 1846, we saw a beautiful Lady. We never said that this lady was the Blessed Virgin but we always said that it was a beautiful Lady.

I do not know if it is the Blessed Virgin or another person. As for me, I believe today that it is the Blessed Virgin. Here is what this Lady said to me:

"If my people continue, what I will say to you will arrive earlier, if it changes a little, it will be a little later.

France has corrupted the universe, one day it will be punished. The faith will die out in France: three quarters of France will not practice religion anymore, or almost no more, the other part will practice it without really practising it. Then, after [that], nations will convert, the faith will be rekindled everywhere.

A great country, now Protestant, in the north of Europe, will be converted; by the support of this country all the other nations of the world will be converted.

Before all that arrives, great disorders will arrive, in the Church, and everywhere. Then, after [that], our Holy Father the Pope will be persecuted. His successor will be a pontiff that nobody expects.


Then, after [that], a great peace will come, but it will not last a long time. A monster will come to disturb it.

All that I tell you here will arrive in the other century, at the latest in the year two thousand."


Maximin Giraud

(She told me to say it some time before.)

My Most Holy Father, your holy blessing to one of your sheep.

Grenoble, July 3,1851.


::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::

MELANIE'S FIRST VERSION OF HER SECRET:

J.M.J.

Secret which the Blessed Virgin gave me on the Mountain of La Salette on September 19, 1846
Secr[e]t.

Mélanie, I will say something to you which you will not say to anybody:

The time of God's wrath has arrived!

If, when you say to the people what I have said to you so far, and what I will still ask you to say, if, after that, they do not convert, (if they do not do penance, and they do not cease working on Sunday, and if they continue to blaspheme the Holy Name of God), in a word, if the face of the earth does not change, God will be avenged against the people ungrateful and slave of the demon.

My Son will make His power manifest! Paris, this city soiled by all kinds of crimes, will perish infallibly. Marseilles will be destroyed in a little time. When these things arrive, the disorder will be complete on the earth, the world will be given up to its impious passions.

The pope will be persecuted from all sides, they will shoot at him, they will want to put him to death, but no one will not be able to do it, the Vicar of God will triumph again this time.

The priests and the Sisters, and the true servants of my Son will be persecuted, and several will die for the faith of Jesus-Christ. A famine will reign at the same time.

After all these will have arrived, many will recognize the hand of God on them, they will convert, and do penance for their sins.

A great king will go up on the throne, and will reign a few years. Religion will re-flourish and spread all over the world, and there will be a great abundance, the world, glad not to be lacking nothing, will fall again in its disorders, will give up God, and will be prone to its criminal passions.

[Among] God's ministers, and the Spouses of Jesus-Christ, there will be some who will go astray, and that will be the most terrible.

Lastly, hell will reign on earth. It will be then that the Antichrist will be born of a Sister, but woe to her! Many will believe in him, because he will claim to have come from heaven, woe to those who will believe in him!

That time is not far away, twice 50 years will not go by.

My child, you will not say what I have just said to you. (You will not say it to anybody, you will not say if you must say it one day, you will not say what that it concerns), finally you will say nothing anymore until I tell you to say it!

I pray to Our Holy Father the Pope to give me his holy blessing.

Mélanie Mathieu, Shepherdess of La Salette, Grenoble, July 6, 1851.

J.M.J.+

:::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::

For Comparison: MAXIMIN'S SECOND VERSION

A few weeks after the first version of the Secret were sent to Bl Pius IX, Benjamin Dausse, who witnessed Maximin and Mélanie write their letters, asked Maximin if he would send some remembrance of the event. Maximin surprisingly answered the request by writing the secret down again in a letter to him dated August 11, 1851:


“On 19 September 1846, I saw a lady bright as the sun, I believe to be the Blessed Virgin. But I never said it was the Blessed Virgin. I’ve always said that I had seen a beautiful lady, but never the Blessed Virgin. It is the Church to judge by what I will say if this is truly the Holy Virgin or anyone else for what I will say here after. She told me in the middle of the story, after the grapes will rot and nuts will spoil. She began by telling me:

If my people are not converted what I say will happen sooner, otherwise it will happen later. Three quarters of France will lose the Faith and the other quarter will practice it with lukewarmness; then afterwards the Faith will reappear in France. A Northern country, now Protestant, will be converted, and with the support of this country the other nations will convert. There will come a peace, and after that peace there will come a monster who will disturb the peace, and peace will come when all nations will be converted. The Pope's successor will be someone that nobody expects. He will not be Roman (written in the margin). The monster will come during the peace, and peace and the monster will come in the 19th or 20th century at the latest. You will not tell this to anyone. You will not tell this to anyone. This is all She told me.

Maximin Giraud, shepherd
August 11, 1851 at Grenoble.


(OBSERVATIONS of importance regarding the dating: Benjamin Dausse declared that at the time of this writing Maximin was still somewhat unlearned, the schooling he received after the apparition at La Salette was still basic at this point we note, and Dausse was of the opinion Maximin believed he was living in the 18th rather than in the 19th century. Therefore, the timing Maximin gave regarding the fulfilment of the prophecy could be corrected to read "20th or 21st century.")

Of interest, Bl Pius IX's sermons seemed to be influenced by Mélanie's secret of La Salette in which he hoped for God to send a Great Leader to deliver the Church.



::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

PART SIX: The FULFILMENT of the OTHER PROPHECIES Mentioned at La Salette - the prophecies Our Lady foretold regarding the great famine later came true. Here is how they were fulfilled as recounted in 'The Sun Her Mantle´, (pp. 108-109):


“(Our Lady) spoke of the recent bad potato crop and declared that the potatoes would continue to rot. They did and not only in France. The winter of 1846 saw Ireland ravaged by the great potato famine. A secular historian has said that a characteristic of the pestilence which impressed all observers was ´the universal, infiltrating stench of the rotting plants. This smell of the charnel house went for to induce many of the peasantry, and still more of their social superiors, to believe that they were confronted by no ordinary trouble, but that this was a visitation from on high, a scourge to punish the sins of the people.' The Census Commission of 1851 estimated that about a million of Ireland's people died of famine. The next year, 1847, March 24 was observed throughout the United Kingdom with very great solemnity, for it was appointed by Royal Proclamation as a day of ´general fast and humiliation before Almighty God, in order to obtain the pardon of our sins, and that we may, in the most devout and solemn manner, send up our prayers and supplications to the Divine Majesty for the removal of those heavy judgements which our manifold sins have most justly deserved, and which Almighty God is pleased to visit the iniquities of this land by a grievous scarcity and dearth of divers articles of sustenance and necessaries of life.'

In the winter of the same year, 200,000 people in Scotland had to be given food from the State to enable them to live to the next harvest. Nearly a fifth of the population of Belgium were getting food from charitable organisations. There were food riots in Belgium, France an England. In France, 72,000 people died in 1854 and another 80,000 the next year – all of starvation. All Europe was short of food, not only because of potato blight, but because of abnormally bad grain harvests – also prophesied by Our Lady.

She also warned that children would die and this, too, was fulfilled in the great outbreak of cholera in which hundreds of thousands died, the majority of them children. In 1849, there were 53,000 deaths from cholera in England and Wales and some 30,000 in Ireland. In 1854, 150,000 people died of cholera in France. During these five years 1849-54, it is reckoned that in Europe, including Russia, some three-quarters of a million people died from cholera.

Our Lady spoke of the plague that was to rot the grapes. It duly came at the end of the 1860s in the shape of phylloxera which, between 1870 and 1905, laid waste practically every vineyard in Europe.”

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


::::::::::::::


:::::::::::::::

July 31, 2020