As a grown man in Paris, Maximin Giraud, one of the seer of the La Salette apparitions, was reduced to such poverty that he was forced to pawn a piece of his clothing. Then, completely broke and without food, he entered the church of Saint Sulpice to kneel before the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary. « I’m hungry, my good Mother," he said, "are you going to let me starve? I did everything you asked of me. I communicated to all your people the serious and solemn warnings you came to bring. I’m about to faint from hunger. If you won’t to pull me out of my misery I’ll turn to your husband Saint Joseph, who I'm sure will have pity on me! »
Weakened by prolonged fasting, he soon fell asleep. A stranger woke him up and invited him to a restaurant, ordering him a hearty meal. When he had satisfied his hunger, the stranger paid the waiter and told Maximin to go to the pawn shop to redeem the piece of clothing he had pawned. He added that he would find in the pocket of that garment a banknote that would get him out of poverty. With these words he was gone and Maximin never found out who the man was. How did a perfect stranger know that he had pawned his garment? How did he know that there was some money in the pocket of that piece of clothing ensuring Maximin’s future? So, unable to give a rational explanation to such an extraordinary experience, he always thought that the stranger was Saint Joseph himself.
***Leon Bloy, Celle qui pleure - The Woman Who Cries (Notre Dame de la Salette), 1908
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