St. Germaine of Pibrac, Patron of the Disabled

Germaine was the daughter of Laurent Cousin, a farm worker, and Marie Laroche. She was born in the village of Pibrac in southern France near Toulouse in 1579. Her mother died soon after her birth.

She had a paralyzed right arm and suffered from ugly swellings on her neck, which were probably tubercular in origin, but were referred to as "scrofula" at that time.

Germaine's father remarried and the stepmother was abusive. She was often forced to sleep in the stable or in a cupboard under the stairs, was fed on scraps, beaten or scalded with hot water for misdeeds, real or imagined. She was also isolated from her healthier brothers and sisters. As soon as she was old enough, she was sent out to the field to care for the sheep.

Germaine never complained, but practiced the presence of God, speaking to him as she minded the sheep. She had a great rapport with younger children, who seemed more accepting of her deformities, and she gave them simple instruction in the faith. She attended Holy Mass frequently and stories were spread that she was able to leave her sheep alone without their straying or being attacked by wolves, which was common in the region.

The adults in her community then began seeing her in a different light. They began to view her less as a sickly, deformed person and more as a saint living in their midst. Some of the mini-miracles circulated about her included the following: a stream parted like the red sea to allow her to cross it on her way to Mass; once when her mother chased her with a stick, accusing her of stealing bread, she let her apron fall and summer flowers fell out in the winter. At Last, her parents began to view her in a different light, too, and invited her to live like the others in the house, but she continued to live as before until one morning she was found dead under the stairs. She was twenty-two years old.

Germaine was buried in the Church of Pibrac opposite the pulpit. When accidentally exhumed in 1644 during a renovation, her body was found incorrupt. In 1793 the casket was desecrated by an anti-Catholic tinsmith named Toulza, who with three accomplices took out the remains and buried them in the sacristy, throwing quick-lime and water on them. After the French Revolution, her body was found to be still intact save where the quick-lime had done its work. Documents attest to more than 400 miracles or extraordinary graces through the intervention of Saint Germaine. They include cures of every kind (of blindness, both congenital and resulting from disease, of hip and spinal disease), and the multiplication of food for the distressed community of the Good Shepherd at Bourges in 1845.

St. Germaine is the patron of: abandoned people, abuse victims, child abuse victims, physically challenged people, disabled people, the poor, the sick, and girls from rural areas.

Prayer of St. Germaine

Dear God, please don't let me be too hungry or too thirsty. Help me to please my mother. And help me to please you.