She also told him that the month of May would be celebrated with much magnificence, and become universal in the Church; that the month of St. Joseph would likewise be kept with solemnity; that devotion to this great Saint would greatly increase, as well as devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
So many miracles wrought everywhere and every day, so many signal testimonies of Mary's protection, made it an obligation on the Community, and especially the Seminary where they had originated, to perpetuate so precious a souvenir.
Two pictures were therefore ordered, one representing the vision of the medal, the other that of St. Vincent's heart. The artist, wishing to depict the Blessed Virgin as accurately as possible, consulted M. Aladel as to the color of the veil.——
The missionary's embarrassment was great; he had forgotten this item, but attaching more importance to the details than Sister Catherine thought, he wrote to her, and under the pretext of warning her against the illusions of the demon, he asked her to describe again the Blessed Virgin's appearance in the vision of the medal. Sister Catherine made this answer: "Just now, my Father, it would be impossible for me to recall all that I saw, one detail alone remains, it is, that the Blessed Virgin's veil was the color of morning light."
This was just what M. Aladel wished to know, and precisely the only thing Sister Catherine could recollect.
These little incidents, regulated by Providence, were not lost; they increased the confidence of the wise Director. When the pictures were placed in the Seminary, M. Aladel discreetly took measures to have Sister Catherine come to see them, just at the very time he would be there as if by chance. Another Sister, accidentally meeting them there, has a suspicion of the truth, and turning suddenly to the worthy Father, she says: "This is certainly the Sister who had the vision!" He is greatly embarrassed, and sees no way of extricating himself from the difficulty, except by calling upon Sister Catherine to answer. She laughed, saying: "You have guessed well," but with such simplicity that the other Sister said to the Father: "Oh! I see plainly that it is not she; you would not have asked her to tell me."
During the course of her long life, Sister Catherine was subjected to trials of this sort.
The details Mgr. de Quélen had received from M. Aladel concerning the vision of the medal interested him deeply, and he was anxious to become acquainted with the favored Sister. M. Aladel replied that the Sister insisted upon remaining unknown. "As for that," said His Grace, "she can put on a veil and speak to me without being seen." M. Aladel excused himself anew, saying it was for him a secret of the confessional.
M. Ratisbonne, miraculously converted in 1842 by the apparition of the Miraculous Medal, also ardently desired to speak with the Sister first favored by this celestial vision, and he often but vainly entreated her Director's permission.
Those around her frequently asked embarrassing questions, or expressed their suspicions. When too closely pressed, she found means of making the curious feel their indiscretion, so that it was not repeated. Moreover, her great simplicity ordinarily disconcerted her interrogators.
On several occasions, the Blessed Virgin seemed to aid her; thus, in the investigation of 1836, and in the deposition made to the Promoter, M. Aladel declared that he had vainly endeavored to persuade Sister Catherine to be present, he could not overcome her repugnance; and moreover, they would interrogate her to no purpose, she had forgotten everything concerning the event.
The same thing happened one day, it is said, in the presence of M. Étienne, then Superior General; he could not succeed in making her speak, she remembered nothing. It is this which gave rise to the rumor in the Community, that the vision was completely effaced from the memory of the Sister who had been favored with it.
Thanks to this opinion, Sister Catherine was enabled to remain long years truly concealed in her modest duties; employed first in the kitchen, then in the clothes-room; afterwards, for nearly forty years, she had charge of the old men's ward of the Hospital d'Enghien, combining with this duty the care of the poultry yard.
She loved these humble duties. Everything was kept in perfect order, and for her there was no greater happiness than that of being among her poor. At the end of her life, she spoke of it as her chief consolation. "I have always," said she, "loved to stay at home; whenever there was question of a walk, I yielded my turn to others that I might serve my poor."
And this was true. One walk only was she unwilling to forego, that which led to the Community, and she knew no other road but that to the Mother House. When she could make this visit she never yielded her turn.
Her attraction for silence and the hidden life always kept her in the rear, as the place most suitable for her, and most favorable to the spirit of recollection. She ceded to none the lowest and most repulsive duties of her ward, duties which she termed the pearls of a Daughter of Charity; she moved calmly and quietly, avoiding precipitation, and when advanced in years, the young Sisters, her assistants, often heard from her lips these words: "Ah! my dear, do not be so agitated, be more gentle."
She regarded as one of the most cherished souvenirs of her Community life, that of her first Sister-Servant, "a dear soul," said she, "who every year sent the first fruits of her garden to the indigent families of the faubourg, or to her old men. The Sisters were not allowed to touch them until this had been done."
This aged Superior was Sister Savard, who never supposed that Sister Catherine was favored with especial graces, and particularly with the vision of the Blessed Virgin.
Our humble daughter Catherine respected and loved all the Sisters under whom she served, and never did she utter a word against them; she saw only their virtues and good qualities.
"Child of duty and labor, but especially of humility," says her last Superior, "Sister Catherine was not truly appreciated except by those who studied her sufficiently to perceive the great simplicity, uprightness, and purity pervading her soul, her mind, her heart, her whole person.
"Never arrogating to herself the slightest merit on account of the singular favors with which the Immaculate Virgin had loaded her, she said, one day towards the close of her life, when Providence permitted a slight allusion to this subject: 'I, favored Sister! I have been only an instrument; it was not for myself the Blessed Virgin appeared to me. I knew nothing, not even how to write; it was in the Community I learned all I know; and because of my ignorance the Blessed Virgin chose me, that no one might doubt."
Is not the conclusion inspired by the spirit of St. Vincent, "I have been chosen, because being nothing, no one could doubt that such great things are the work of God."
Sister Catherine cared little for the esteem or contempt of others. Despite her rigid silence, there always hovered over her the suspicion that it was she who had seen the Blessed Virgin; no one dared tell her so; but in consequence of the suspicion, she was more closely observed, and more severely judged than any one else, and if by chance her companions discovered in her some slight weakness of nature, or even the absence of some heroic virtue, the thought was immediately rejected that the Blessed Virgin had chosen so ordinary a person.
The testimony of one of her first companions confirms the impression on this point, an impression repeated a hundred fold. This companion writes to Sister Dufès: "Having passed six years with Sister Catherine, and worked constantly with her one year, it would seem that I could cite a great number of details full of interest and edification; but I am forced to confess that her life was so simple, so uniform, that I find nothing in it to remark. Notwithstanding the whispered assurances that she was the Sister so favored by the Blessed Virgin, I scarcely credited it, so much was her life like that of others. Sometimes, I sought to enlighten myself indirectly on the subject by questioning her as to the impression such extraordinary occurrences had produced in the Seminary, hoping that her answers would betray her, and thereby satisfy my curiosity, but she replied with so much simplicity that my hopes were always deceived."
It is true, Sister Catherine had nothing remarkable about her, and yet nothing common or trivial.
Her height was above the medium; her regular