June 15 - Saint Germaine Cousin of Pibrac
Germaine was the daughter of Laurent Cousin, an agricultural labourer, and was born about the year 1579 at Pibrac, a village near Toulouse. Her mother, Marie Laroche, died when her little girl was scarcely out of the cradle. From her birth Germaine suffered from ill-health; she was scrofulous, and her right hand was powerless and deformed.
Her father had no affection for her, whilst his second wife actively disliked her. She treated her stepdaughter most harshly, and after the birth of her own children she kept Germaine away from her healthier stepbrothers and sisters. The poor girl was made to sleep in the stable, or under the stairs, was fed on scraps, and as soon as she was old enough was sent out to mind sheep in the pastures.
Out in the fields however, alone with nature, she learned to commune with her Creator. Nothing could keep her from Mass. If she heard the bell when she was in the fields, she would plant her crook and her distaff in the ground, commend her flock to her angel guardian, and hurry off to church. Never once on her return did she find that a sheep ahd strayed, or had fallen prey to the wolves that lurked in the neighbouring forest of Boucône, ever-ready to pounce upon unattended sheep. As often as she could she made her communion, and her fervour was long remembered in the village.
It might have been thought that anyone so poor as Germaine would have been unable to exercise the corporal works of mercy. Love, however, can always find a way, and the scanty food that was grudgingly doled out to her was shared with beggars. Even this was made a cause for complaint. One cold winter's day her stepmother pursued her with a stick, declaring that she was concealing stolen bread in her apron. To the amazement of the pitying neighbours, who would have protected her, that which fell from her apron was not bread, but summer flowers. Contempt now gave way to veneration, and the inhabitants of Pibrac began to realize that they had a saint in their midst. Even her father and stepmother relented towards her; they would now have allowed her to take her proper place in their home, but Germaine chose to continue to live as before. It was not for long. One morning she was found lying dead on her straw pallet under the stairs. She was twenty-two years old.
Her body, which was burried in the church of Pibrac, was accidentally exhumed in 1644, forty-three years after her death, and was found in perfect preservation. It was afterwards enclosed in a leaden coffin, which was placed in the sacristy. Sixteen years later it was still flexible and well preserved. This circumstance, and the numberous miracles which were ascribed to her, encouraged a desire for official sanction of her cult. Owing to the French Revolution, however, and other hindrances, her beatification and canonization were deferred until the pontificate of Pius IX. An annual pilgrimage takes place on June 15 to Pibrac church, where her relics still rest.
Source: Buttlers Lives of the Saints, concise edition, revised and updated, editied by Michael Walsh (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1991)