Germain Cousin is a French saint born in 1579 to humble parents at Pibrac, a village 15 km from Toulouse. She is venerated as the patron saint of victims of child abuse since, as a child, she herself was subjected to cruelty and abuse at the hands of her stepmother.
She was weak and ill, and was born as a disabled child with a deformed and paralyzed right hand. Germain lost her mother when she was still a small child. Her father Laurent Cousin subsequently married a lady named Hortense.
Laurent was an inconsiderate man who paid little attention to his daughter. Germain was given so little food that she started crawling to dog’s dish for food. Her father wasn’t there to protect the little child when her stepmother left her in a drain and forgot her for three days. Nor did he interfere when Hortense poured boiling water on to Germain’s legs.
Germain became more weak and ill because of the ill-treatment at the hands of her stepmother. She was affected with a disease known as scrofula, a kind of tuberculosis that causes the neck glands to swell up. She started falling prey to multiple diseases and Hortense started hating her ever more.
Watching their mother's treatment of their half-sister, her siblings learned to despise and torment her, putting ashes in her food and pitch in her clothes. Their mother, though, found this very entertaining.
As Hortense was afraid that her own children would catch the disease, she made Germain to sleep out in the barn. The only warmth Germain had on frozen winter nights was the woolly sheep that slept there too.
Germain was soon entrusted with the sheep and in her loneliness, she found a friend in God. She had a rosary made of knots in string and her very simple prayers were: "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." Out of that simple faith, grew a profound holiness and a deep trust of God.
She was very particular about attending the Mass daily. While going for the mass, she would entrust the sheep to God, and the villagers were surprised that the sheep were never attacked by wolves when she was away! Once they witnessed the swelling river parting, so that she could cross and get to the church for Mass.
Germain was very considerate towards the poor and she used to share whatever little food she had, with the beggars. According to one story, one day in winter, when she was being chased by her stepmother who accused her of stealing bread, she opened her apron and fresh summer flowers fell out. Germain offered the flowers to her stepmother as a sign of forgiveness. She said humbly: "Please accept this flower, Mother. God sends it to you in sign of his forgiveness."
As the whole village began to talk about this holy child, even Hortense began to soften her feelings towards her. She even invited Germaine back to the house but Germain had become used to her straw bed and continued to sleep in it.
One morning in the early summer of 1601, her father found that she had not risen at the usual hour and went to call her, only to find her dead on her pallet of vine-twigs. She was 22 years old at that time.
Her remains were buried in the parish church of Pibrac in front of the pulpit. In 1644, when the grave was opened to bury one of her relatives, the body of Germain was discovered fresh and perfectly preserved. It was then moved to a casket which was placed in the sacristy, and in 1661 and 1700 the remains were viewed and found fresh and intact by the vicars-general of Toulouse, who had left testamentary depositions of the fact.
On 7 May 1854, Pius IX proclaimed her beatification and he proclaimed her a saint on 29 June 1867.
Other Saints of the Day
1. Saint Abraham
2. Saint Crescentia
3. Saint Edburga of Winchester
4. Saint Landeilnus
5. Saint Orsisius
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