I. Introduction: Our Lady who Wept in the Alps

The Sanctuary of Our Lady of La Salette is raised to 1770 meters of altitude in the Tailleffer massif, in the department of Isère, in the French Alps, about twenty-nine kilometres from the city of Corps and seventy-five from Grenoble. It is the Marian sanctuary located at the highest altitude of Western Europe, and it is also, in many ways, the most austere and the most dramatically beautiful: a place of mountain, of silence and of rock, where the wind drags the clouds and the snow remains several months a year, and where a spring fountain next to the place where the Virgin appeared crying to two humble alpine shepherds on September 19, 1846.

The apparition of La Salette is unique in the history of Marian apparitions because of the intensity of her message, which is above all a message of maternal pain: the Virgin appears crying, sitting on a rock, with her face in her hands, in an attitude of deep affliction. She is not the glorious Virgin of Guadalupe or the Immaculate radiant of Lourdes or the luminous Lady of Fatima: she is the Dolored Mother who weeps for her children who have forgotten her and who have moved away from God, who intercede for them before her Son Jesus and who comes to warn them, with love, of the consequences of that distance.

The message of La Salette has a particular urgency for today's world: Sunday work, blasphemy, the abandonment of prayer and the neglect of the sacraments are exactly the same phenomena that the Virgin pointed out in 1846 as causes of God's alienation. The shrine of La Salette, with its more than 200,000 pilgrims per year, remains a place of active pilgrimage, conversion and silent listening to the Mother's cry.

II. The historical context: France in 1846

France in 1846 was in a deep social and religious crisis that was at the same time an inheritance of the 1789 Revolution and a consequence of the process of industrialization and accelerated urbanization of the 19th century. The reign of Luis Felipe (July Monarchy, 1830- 1848) represented the triumph of the liberal, secular and anti-religious bourgeoisie. The clergy had lost much of their influence in the cities, and in the field, although religious practice was more solid, the neglect of the sacraments, work on festive days and the usual blasphemy were widespread phenomena.

The region of Corps and the Oisans, in the department of Isère, was a rural and mountainous area, with a livestock economy, with a peasant population of simple but often neglected faith. Work on Sunday was common in harvest times. blasphemy - especially the "oath in the name of the Son of God" - was such a deep-rooted custom that virtually no one perceived it as sin.

In this context, the warnings of the Lady of La Salette have an amazing sociological precision: it does not speak of heresy or political persecution, but of the daily and concrete moral violations of that Alpine agricultural community. What the Virgin cries in La Salette is not an abstraction: it is the reality of the life of the peasants of Isère in 1846.

III. The two pastures

The two pastures had been known only a few days before the apparition. Mélanie had been working for farmer Pierre Selme for several weeks on the mountain pastures of the Planeau. Maximimin had arrived in that area the day before, on 18 September, to temporarily accompany the daughter of farmer Baptiste Pra. The two children were not close friends and had no prior relationship. This detail is relevant to the assessment of the credibility of the testimony: their accounts of the apparition, collected separately, agree on all the essential points despite the brevity of their treatment.

IV. The apparition: September 19, 1846

The place and time

On 19 September 1846, which was Friday, the two children went up with their flocks to the pastures of the Planeau, at about 1850 meters altitude, on the slopes of Mount Gargas, in the municipal term of La Salette- Fallavaux. It was a cold and clear day, typical of the Alps at the end of September. At noon, the children ate their lunch next to a fountain that ran between the rocks, and then went to sleep for about an hour.

When they woke up, alarmed because the cows had disappeared from the place, the children went up a small top to look for them, and when they came down back they saw a light of extraordinary intensity, like "a fallen sun," much brighter than the sun itself. Mélanie, afraid, let go of her staff; Maximin encouraged her to pick it up, saying, "I have my staff, I can defend myself."

The Lady's description

From among that light came the figure of a woman sitting on the rock where the children had eaten, with elbows standing on their knees and their heads between their hands, in a weeping attitude. It was dressed in a long, white suit with light flashes; it was wearing a gold apron, garland-like flowers around the head, a brighter-colored cappuccino and, on the shoulders, a chain of flowers that held a crucifix surrounded by instruments of the Passion: a hammer on the right and a tongs on the left. His shoes were white with golden roses, and his crown was like the sun.

When the children approached - she said to them, "Come, my children, be not afraid; I am here to tell you a great news" - they could see his face: it was beautiful but covered with tears. The Lady kept crying throughout the apparition, even as she spoke.

The Lady's Speech in Patois

The Lady began to speak in French, but then she continued in the Patois dialect of the Oisans, the language that children understood best. The fact that the Virgin communicated in the local dialect of those alpine peasants was interpreted from the beginning as a sign of their maternal condescension and the authenticity of the apparition: no person cultivated from the time would have imagined a heavenly apparition in pathis.

The Lady's speech, as the children recalled and transcribed it, was articulated in several parts:

The Mother's complaints

"If my people do not want to submit, I am forced to drop my Son's arm. It's so strong and so heavy that I can't hold it anymore. I've been suffering for you for so long. If I want my Son not to abandon you, I have to pray him without ceasing; and you do not heed that. Even if you pray well, even if you do well, you cannot make up for the sorrow I took for my Son. I have given you six days to work; I have reserved the seventh, and they do not want to give it to me. This is what makes my Son's arm so heavy. Those who carry carts cannot swear without putting the name of my Son. These are the two things that make my Son's arm so heavy."

The warnings of hunger and disease

"If the harvest rot, it is only because of you. I made you see it last year with the potatoes; you did not listen to it. On the contrary, when you found the rotten potatoes, you cursed, giving the name of my Son. They're gonna keep rotting; there won't be any left for Christmas."

The children did not understand the word "potatoes" in French (the Lady said potatoes); Maximin asked Mélanie in pathis what that meant, and the Lady answered them in pathis: "Ah, you do not understand, my children; I will tell you otherwise." And he continued, "If you have wheat, do not sow. What you plant the insects will eat, and what is left will be destroyed by tripping it. There will be a great hunger. Before hunger comes, children under the age of seven will be attacked by tremors and die in the arms of the people who have them. The others will do penance for hunger. The nuts will rot, the grapes will rot."

The Lady then secretly communicated to each of the children a particular message - the so-called "secrets" - that Mélanie and Maximin promised not to reveal to each other or to anyone else at the moment.

The promise and the farewell

After the secrets, the Lady resumed her speech aloud: "If they become, the stones and the rocks will become piles of wheat, and the potatoes will be sown alone in the fields." He then asked the children if they prayed well, and they, with the frankness of childhood, said that they almost did not. The Lady told them that they should pray in the morning and at night, even if it was only a godfather and a avemary, and if they could not do more, they would pray even that. He also asked them to convey their message to the entire people.

Then he crossed the stream, which was running by the fountain, and rose gently on the mountain, facing the children, without turning their backs, and disbanded in the light. Mélanie recalled that in the end they only saw the head, then nothing.

The fountain and the flowers

A striking detail of the apparition is that the source next to which the Lady sat, which at that time of the year was dry - the children confirmed it - began to send abundant water from the day of the apparition. This water, later analyzed without any special mineral composition, was used by pilgrims from the beginning and numerous curations attributed to it have been documented.

V. The message of La Salette: the cry of the Mother

La Salette's message has a deep theological structure that theologians have analyzed over more than one hundred and seventy years. Its main elements are:

The "arm of my Son"

The image of the "arm of her Son" that the Virgin can hardly hold is the central image of the message. Christ, the judge, is about to drop his arm - that is, to stop containing the action of divine justice - on a people who has seriously offended him. The Virgin intercede between the righteousness of Christ and mercy: she has been holding that arm for centuries, begging for us. But there is a limit beyond which maternal intercession cannot avoid the consequences of the freely chosen choices of men.

This image is not new: it is rooted in the medieval theology of Mary as "medianera" and "runner," and has parallels in visions of Saint Hildegard of Bingen, Saint Brigida of Sweden and Saint Catherine of Siena. What makes it new in La Salette is the crudeness and humanity of the image: Mary is not glorably enthroned, but is exhausted by the task of intercession, on the brink of exhaustion.

Work on Sunday and blasphemy

The two concrete sins that the Virgin points out as causes of the "weight of her Son's arm" are work on Sunday and blasphemy. The first is the violation of the precept of Sunday rest, which the Council of Trent had confirmed and that the Industrial Revolution was already beginning to erode. The second - "those who carry carts cannot swear without putting the name of my Son" - is the usual blasphemy of the mulers and car drivers, who routinely swore in the name of Jesus Christ. Both phenomena were documented in the region of Corps and the Oisans in 1846.

The ads of carelessness

The Lady accurately announces the consequences of infidelity: the rot of the potato and wheat crops, the disease of children under seven years of age, hunger. These announcements have a remarkable historical accuracy: in 1845-1846 the great epidemic of Phytophthora infestansthe fungus that destroyed the potato crops in Ireland (where it caused the Great Hunger, with more than a million dead) and on the continent. In France, the 1846 potato harvest was indeed disastrous. The Lady talks about what the people of Corps have already begun to see, but not yet related to their own moral behavior.

The condition of promise

The Lady closes the message with an implicit promise: "If they become, the stones and the rocks will become piles of wheat." This promise of abundance as a reward for conversion is characteristic of the biblical prophecy (Ez 36.29; Jl 2.23-24) and it links the message of La Salette into the veteroestamentary tradition of the prophets who announce the catastrophe and call for conversion to avoid it.

VI. The secrets of La Salette

One of the most debated and fascinating aspects of La Salette is the "secrets" that the Lady entrusted separately to Mélanie and Maximin. The children promised not to reveal them to each other, and for several years they kept that secret with a fidelity that astonished those who questioned them.

Secrets before the authorities

In 1851, after years of pressure from the ecclesiastical authorities who wanted to know the content of the secrets to complete the investigation of the apparitions, Pope Pius IX received sealed letters from both children with their respective secrets. The Pope read them and stated: "These secrets are not for me," allowing us to understand that their content concerned him personally as head of the Church.

The secret of Maximin

The text of the secret of Maximin, written in 1851, is short and cryptic. It speaks of a "test for faith" that is coming, of the corruption of the clergy, and ends with words of encouragement for the Pope and the Church. It was published in part in the 19th century by the Bishop of Montpellier without Roman authorization, which caused controversy. The full text was not officially published.

The secret of Mélanie and its versions

Mélanie's secret is much more extensive and complex. His first text, delivered to the Pope in 1851, was brief. But in 1879, already in Italy, Mélanie published in Lecce a very extensive version of his secret, which included references to the imminence of great tribulations for the Church, the corruption of the clergy and hierarchy, the advent of the antichrist and the purification of the world. This extensive version was put on the Index of Books prohibited by the Congregation of the Holy Office in 1923. The Church has never pronounced a definitive judgment on the secrets of La Salette beyond the general recognition of the authenticity of the apparition.

VII. The Church Process and Recognition (1851)

The ecclesiastical research on the apparitions of La Salette was one of the most rigorous and exhaustive in history. It was directed by the Bishop of Grenoble, Mons. Philibert de Bruillard, who appointed a commission of sixteen members - theologians, doctors and lawyers - to examine the fact.

• October 1846: First interviews of the children by the parish priest of Corps, Father Mélin, and the bishop of Grenoble. The testimonies of Mélanie and Maximin, taken separately, coincide at all essential points.
• November 1846: The bishop of Grenoble provisionally authorizes the pilgrimages. The channel of the fountain that manna next to the place of apparition is cleaned and channelled.
• 1847-1848: First organized pilgrimages. Numerous cures attributed to water from the source are documented. The first, on October 1, 1846 - twelve days after the apparition - was the sudden healing of Louis Bouillet, a four-year-old boy from Corps, paralytic and unable to walk, who was taken to the fountain by his mother.
• 19 September 1851: Fifth anniversary of the apparition. Bishop Philibert of Bruillard issues the episcopal decree that declares the apparitions "worthy of faith" and authorizes the liturgical worship of Our Lady of La Salette. The text of the decree recognizes "the reality of apparition" and declares that the facts "carry in themselves all the characters of truth and that the faithful are justified in believing in it with certainty."
• 1852: The successor of Bruillard, Mons. Ginoulhiac, confirms the recognition and authorizes the construction of the sanctuary on the mountain.
• 1879: The Congregation of Rites approves the liturgical office of Our Lady of La Salette.
• 1904: Pontifical coronation of the image of Our Lady of La Salette, by delegation of Pope Pius X.

VIII. History of the Sanctuary

The first years (1846-1860)

From the days immediately after the apparition, the mountain of La Salette became a place of pilgrimage. The first pilgrims were neighbors of Corps and the Oisans who went up on foot to the pastures of the Planeau to pray by the fountain and take water. In the winter of 1846-1847 a first provisional chapel was built. In 1852, the bishop of Grenoble authorized the construction of a definitive sanctuary.

The basilica was built between 1852 and 1865 under the direction of the architect Pierre- Charles Bossan - the same one that would later design the basilica of Fourvière in Lyon. The first stone was blessed on May 25, 1852 by Bishop Ginoulhiac. The Basilica was consecrated on August 21, 1879 by Cardinal Guibert, Archbishop of Paris.

The disputes of the 19th century

The story of La Salette was not without turbulence. The process of ecclesiastical recognition was complicated by the later life of the two seers: Maximin had episodes of scandalous conduct that raised doubts about his credibility; Mélanie published more and more extensive versions of his secret, which generated theological disputes and were finally condemned. Moreover, in 1854, Father Charles Déléon wrote a brochure attacking the authenticity of the apparitions that had a great spread; he was answered by the Bishop of Grenoble and his arguments were refuted one by one. In 1857, an Alsatian priest, Father Cartellier, stated that the alleged supernatural origin of the source was false and that he himself had seen it manar before 1846; his testimony was discredited.

The sanctuary in the 20th century

In the 20th century, the shrine of La Salette lived several phases of renewal and growth. During World War II, access to the mountain was very difficult, and the pilgrimages were drastically reduced. In the post-war period, the sanctuary experienced a remarkable spiritual rebirth. John Paul II visited La Salette in 1983, during his first pastoral trip to France, and prayed at the image of the Virgin Dolorosa in the basilica. In 1996, Cardinal Ratzinger (future Benedict XVI) presided over the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the apparition.

IX. The Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette

In 1852, the Bishop of Grenoble founded a religious congregation to attend the shrine of La Salette: the Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette (MS). The congregation was approved by the Holy See in 1890 and is currently present in more than 25 countries on all continents. His specific charism is the evangelizing mission inspired by the message of La Salette: to meet the people most far from the Church, as the Virgin went to meet the two pastors who barely knew how to pray, and to call them to conversion with patience and maternal love.

The Saletian missionaries - as they are sometimes called - have developed their own spirituality focused on three pillars: reconciliation (the message of penance of La Salette), evangelization (transmitting the message to the most remote) and the community (living the message in fraternity). His spirituality has profoundly influenced the liturgical and pastoral renewal of the 20th century.

X. Influence on spirituality and literature

The apparition of La Salette has had a surprisingly wide cultural and literary influence, especially in France.

La Salette y el catolicismo literario francés

The Catholic writer and philosopher Léon Bloy was one of the great apostles of La Salette's message in the literary world. In 1879 he published Salvation by Jewswhere La Salette occupies a central place, and in 1892 Je m’accusewhere he passionately defends the authenticity of the apparition. For Bloy, La Salette was the "never finished Gospel" of modern times: the Virgin who weeps is the image of the Church who suffers for the sins of her children.

Joris-Karl Huysmans, el short story To rebours, had its definitive conversion to Catholicism through, in part, contact with the spirituality of La Salette. The poet Paul Claudel quoted La Salette in several of his writings. The writer Georges Bernanos, author of Journal of a rural priestHe also lived marked by the spirituality of La Salette: the image of the painful Virgin passes through all her work.

Salette and contemporary theology

Pope Benedict XVI, in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est (2005) and in numerous speeches, he has implicitly evoked the theme of the "weeping of Mary" as an image of the divine mercy he suffers for the sins of his children. The Salette offers contemporary theology a particularly vivid and concrete image of maternal intercession, which complements and enriches the brightest image of Lourdes and Fatima.

XI. Data from the present Sanctuary

XII. Prayer to Our Lady of La Salette

"Our Lady of La Salette, the Reconciliation of sinners, pray for us.

---

Related: Fátima file · Dossier Lourdes · Guadalupe file · Pray the Rosary