Michael Cremo - Human Devolution - A Vedic Alternative To Darwin's Theory

Upon returning to Belgium, Joachime Dehant was examined by Dr. Gustave Froidbise, who verified the cure. He also gave testimony that he saw the wound just before Dehant’s departure from Belgium, thus defusing any thought that Dehant had been cured before going to Lourdes (Boissarie 1933, p. 8). Here is the text of the statement he gave after examining Dehant just before her departure from Lourdes: “I, the undersigned, Gustave Froidbise, doctor of medicine, etc., at Ohey, in the province of Namur, Belgium, declare that I have examined Mlle. Joachime Dehant, aged twenty-nine, born at Wanfercée-Baulet, resident at Gesves, and I certify as follows: Dislocation of the hip-joint on the right side. Retraction of the lateral tibial muscles of the right leg which causes club-foot (talipes varus). An ulcer which covers two-thirds of the outer surface of the right leg. Hence my present declaration, Ohey, September

6, 1878. Dr. G. Froidbise” (Bertrin 1908, p. 106). To this document he added the results of his examination of Dehant on the day she returned from Lourdes: “I, the undersigned, doctor of medicine, etc. at Ohey, province of Namur in Belgium, declare that I have examined Mlle. Joachime Dehant, aged twenty-nine, born at Wanfercée-Baulet, and resident at Gesves, and I affirm that the lesions mentioned in the accompanying certificate have completely disappeared. A simple redness shows the place where the ulcer existed.—Dr. G. Froidbise. Gesves, Sep. 19th, 1878” (Bertrin 1908, p. 107). Dr. Henri Vergez, of the faculty of medicine at the University of Montpellier, stated: “The sudden cure of a sore, or rather of a spreading chronic ulcer, in a very decayed constitution, and the spontaneous reduction of dislocation of the hip, are facts quite outside natural explanation” (Bertrin 1908, p. 107).

Some extreme skeptics went so far as to suggest that Dehant had no wound at all. But the testimony of many credible witnesses eliminated this suggestion. Simon Deploige, professor of law at the Catholic University of Louvain, and a physician, Dr. Royer, conducted a careful investigation of the evidence for the wound. Dr. Boissarie (1933, pp. 8–9) reviewed their procedures: “Taking Dr. Froidebise’s certificate of September 6th as a starting point, they followed the history of this ulcer, so to speak, from hour to hour, up to the time of its disappearance. They questioned . . . : 1st. Joachime Dehant’s neighbors who saw the ulcer immediately before the departure for Lourdes; 2nd. The fellow travelers on the journey; 3rd. The managers of the hotel where Joachime stopped at Lourdes. Not one of these witnesses questioned was related to the cured girl. . . . All the witnesses questioned were interviewed in their homes without preliminary notice and without having had any opportunity of collusion among them. All read over their depositions and certified their being a faithful and exact account.”

Deploige and Royer stated in their conclusion: “Two facts seem duly established by this inquiry. 1st fact: The existence on Mlle. Joachime, at least up to September 12, 1878, at ten o’clock in the evening, if not up to the morning of the 13th, of an ulcer covering nearly the whole right leg from the knee to the ankle, exposing the raw flesh, which was broken out in pimples, inflamed and blackish in places; disgusting to the sight, suppurating profusely, giving out a foul odor and, according to medical testimony, incapable of being cured, naturally, in thirteen days, and making no progress towards improvement. 2nd fact: The entire disappearance of the same ulcer and its replacement by new, dry, healthy skin from September 13, 1878, in the forenoon or, at the very latest, towards nine or ten o’clock in the evening” (Boissarie 1933, p. 9). Church officials, after reviewing all the medical evidence, declared the cure miraculous.

Early in the history of Lourdes, there were suggestions that the cures may have been the result of medicinal properties of the water. A chemical analysis showed the water to have a mineral content similar to other waters in the region (Bertrin 1908, p. 116). Others proposed that the power of suggestion may have caused the cures. But even very young children, unable to comprehend such suggestion, have been cured of physical defects. Bertrin (1908, pp. 142–143) states, “George Lemesle, aged two years and seven months, was cured of infantile paralysis (1895); Fernand Balin, aged two years and six months, was cured of a crooked knee (1895); little Duconte, two years old, whom his doting mother carried to the Grotto in an almost dying condition (1858), was restored to health; Yvonne Aumaître, whom the doctor, her father, plunged into the miraculous water in spite of her cries, was taken out cured of a double club-foot (1896); at the age of nineteen months, A. Mertens was cured of paralysis in the right arm (1895); Pierre Estournet, an unweaned baby, had his eyes cured (1864); and lastly, Paul Mercère was cured of two congenital ruptures when a year old (1866). Of course there is no question of psychotherapeutics in such cures.” Dr. Alexis Carrel, who won the Nobel Prize for medicine and physiology in 1912, was a vocal supporter of the Lourdes healings (Rogo 1982, p. 261).

In November 1882, Francois Vion-Dury, a soldier, suffered burns on his face as he rescued people trapped in a fire at a hotel café in Dijon, France. As a result of the burns, the retinas of his two eyes became detached, causing almost complete blindness. He was released from the army with a pension on July 11, 1884. In the course of a proceeding to get the amount of his pension increased, he was examined by Dr. Dor, of Lyon, France, who on September 16, 1884, stated: “Although the retina in the left eye has returned to place, this eye is still unable to distinguish night from day. With the right eye, M. Vion-Dury has difficulty in counting fingers held a foot away. He is thus incapable of doing any work and must be considered completely and incurably blind in both eyes” (Agnellet 1958, p. 52). In 1890, Vion-Dury entered a hospital at Confort, France. Nuns at the hospital convinced him to pray for the intercession of Our Lady of Lourdes and gave him a bottle of Lourdes water. The next day, after his prayers, he put some of the water on his eyelids. “My sight came back in a flash,” he later recalled. “I didn’t believe it myself” (Agnellet 1958, p.

53). Dr. Dor, a Protestant, reported to a conference of eye specialists in Paris: “Vion-Dury was nearly blind. His visual acuity was one-fiftieth, about the same in each eye. . . . The detachment of the retinae was diagnosed by a large number of specialists and had resisted all treatment. Vion-Dury’s condition was static for seven and a half years. Then, without any special treatment . . . his sight became about normal” (Agnellet1958, p. 53). The Church recognized Vion-Dury’s cure as miraculous.

In 1887, Catherine Lapeyre had a cancerous tumor on her tongue. A doctor recommended an operation. Instead, Lapeyre went to Lourdes, but after washing her mouth and bathing in the waters was not cured. In January 1889, Lapeyre was admitted to the main hospital in Toulouse, France. After unsuccessful attempts at treatment, a surgeon decided to remove the tumor. Before the operation, a photograph of the tongue was taken. Boissarie (1933, p. 40) said the photograph showed “a malignant tumor, jagged and vegetating, which had developed on her tongue.” Three months after the operation, the tumor returned. The surgeon proposed another operation, but Lapeyre did not want it, and left the hospital for a room in Toulouse. In July 1889, she was refused a place on a pilgrimage to Lourdes, as she had already gone in 1887. Her friends advised her to simply pray with them to the Virgin for nine days. Lapeyre did this and also washed herself with Lourdes water. On the ninth day she was cured. Boissarie (1933, p. 41) stated: “Her tumor diminished and disappeared. The glands of her neck were no longer swollen; she was able to eat and to talk. The dreadful pains in her head which had followed the path of the nerves of the tongue and caused corresponding pains in the ear had completely disappeared. In a few hours this trouble, which had seemed incurable and which had reappeared after the operations, had ceased without leaving any trace other than a very ordinary scar.” Boissarie (1933, p. 42) added, “Thus, according to the statements of the doctors, and from the progress of the disease as shown by the photograph, which gives a very exact idea of the lesion, there is no doubt that Catherine Lapeyre had a cancer of the tongue and consequently an incurable affection, which would have proved fatal in a very short time. Her cure, happening within a few hours, with no treatment, upsets every calculation. We never experience such results in the practice of medicine.” When Lapeyre was examined at the medical bureau in Lourdes in 1897, doctors saw the tongue was healed and that there was no chance of reappearance of the cancer.