“O Mary conceived without sin, at Your feet You see sinners and unhappy people, confessing that they are so unhappy only because they are sinners. The majesty of God has been publicly insulted in our midst; His holy day violated by commerce, labor and pleasure; His Church debased, unrecognized and persecuted. We have abandoned ourselves, without measure and without restraint, to sinful joys and selfgratification, shaking off the salutary yoke of all obedience and all respect, and we have pursued only one purpose – material wellbeing – thus forgetting our family duties, our true interests, our eternal destinies... O God, 122 Vol. LVI, No 5 Magnificat come to our assistance! Come, for without You we are lost! We come before You under the patronage of our Mother, the Immaculate Virgin.” The more alarming the situation became, the more urgent the cry of faith became. By January 1871, Paris could hardly sustain the efforts of a heroic defense. Then a spectacle of supernatural beauty took place at Notre-Dame des Victoires. It was on the evening of January 17 – around six o’clock, to be precise. A compact crowd filled the sanctuary, having come to take part in the public novena in honor of Our Lady. Among the initiators of this novena was Father “It may be said that if France was driven to defeat by the weakness of its organization, it also passed through the entire series of adverse odds. For example, there was nothing more fatal for it than the role played by the weather. The meteorological circumstances fought constantly against us. It seemed as if nature had made a pact with our enemies. Every time they set out, they were favored by wonderful weather, while all our movements were hampered by rain or cold. [...] Who does not remember the exceptional weather that prevailed [...] while the Prussian army was marching on Paris and setting up the siege works? Who does not also remember the springlike temperatures that prevailed at the end of January, immediately following the armistice?... As hard as the winter had been for our military movements in the East, so much it was favorable for the return of the Prussians to Germany... Yes, a set of unfortunate coincidences were joined to the organic weakness of France, thwarting all its efforts. This combination of things was such that really, when one considers it, one is tempted to wonder whether there were not some reason higher than physical causes, a kind of expiation of national sins... In the presence of such prodigious misfortunes, one is no longer surprised that religious souls could say: Digitus Dei est hic! The finger of God is there! (Charles de Freycinet, La Guerre en province)
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