There are certain souls who, through no merit of their own, but simply by a gratuitous design of Providence, are endowed with singular gifts and extraordinary charisms, whose effects surpass the limitations of nature in such an evident way that it is impossible to deny their supernatural origin.

One such person was born in the small town of Cossé-en-Champagne, France, on July 16, 1901. Yvonne Beauvais was her name, and she received from God numerous mystical gifts, including bilocation and glossolalia, with a view to a sublime mission that would be entrusted to her by divine love.

A highly chosen soul

Yvonne had an ordinary childhood, marked from the age of three by financial difficulties due to the premature death of her father. In 1922, at the age of twenty-one, she became seriously ill and was sent to a hospital in Malestroit, Brittany, cared for by Augustinian nuns, where she convalesced for almost six months.

During this period, she awakened to the mystical life and religious vocation. On March 18, 1927, having overcome several obstacles, she finally entered the Augustinian convent, taking the name by which she would become known: Yvonne-Aimée de Jésus.

Due to the great discretion Yvonne kept regarding her mystical gifts, it is not known exactly when her bilocations began. What is certain is that Providence granted her this privilege especially for a mission: to rescue the profaned Blessed Sacrament throughout the world.

Indeed, the gift of bilocation – witnessed to in the history of extraordinary mystical phenomena from St. Ambrose and Mary of Agreda to Don Bosco, Padre Pio, and other contemporaries – consists of the ability to be in two places at the same time; more precisely, to appear or act at a distance, while the physical body remains where it was at the beginning of the bilocation.

There are records of at least 151 such events in Yvonne’s life,1 in many of which she recovered consecrated Hosts from the hands of sacrilegious individuals in different French cities and even more distant places, such as Germany and England.

First reported expeditions

The first witnessed records of these supernatural expeditions date back to 1923, therefore before her entry into religious life. On April 23 of that year, during a stay in Malestroit, Yvonne confided to a nun that, during the early morning, she bilocated to a residence and rang the doorbell. To the lady who answered, she simply said she had “come for the Host.” The lady of the house then led her to the living room and handed her the consecrated Host. “Inspired by Jesus, Yvonne spoke with this woman for half an hour and, the next day, she recognized her need for Confession.”2

Another time, Our Lord called upon Yvonne to rescue Him from a woman who, for some days, had kept a Host received unworthily during Mass. She went to the house of this sacrilegious woman and, as soon as she found her, revealed the reason for her visit. The woman paled in surprise, but quickly handed over the Blessed Sacrament without difficulty, and Yvonne then exhorted her about the seriousness of that sin and the need for conversion. After which she shed tears of sincere repentance.3

But not all missions were so simple… Once, for example, after a ninety-three-kilometre train journey, from which she miraculously returned in moments, Yvonne managed with great difficulty to accomplish her goal, as she recounts:

“I was not able to go unscathed while rescuing the outraged Host from the hands of that poor soul. I had the impression of having a real demon before me, such was the hatred manifest in her expression.”4

A wicked man, overcome by grace

Sometimes, angelic manifestations accompanied her expeditions. Having been mysteriously transported to another city, one hundred and seventy kilometres from Malestroit, Yvonne found herself beside a waiting car. “An Angel was driving it, without a doubt,”5 she later commented. The vehicle left her in front of a house in the suburbs and then disappeared.

The man who answered the door confessed that he believed in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and that it was hatred against God that moved him to commit sacrileges. He intended to take consecrated Hosts to places of desecration in Paris; and he mocked Yvonne when he heard her admonitions. He was, as she noted, possessed by a demon. Firmly, the nun demanded that the desecrator indicate the hiding place of the Hosts, and he obeyed reluctantly.

“This has never brought me misfortune,” he pondered.

“It may happen soon,” Yvonne replied.

After rescuing the Hosts, the Augustinian nun felt Jesus speak through her and commanded:

“Kneel down and make an act of contrition!”

Thankful for the grace, the unfortunate man knelt, prayed... and broke down, sobbing. Jesus had conquered him.

“I came from France just to get it”

On several occasions, even before entering the convent, Yvonne excercized the gift of glossolalia, the ability to speak unknown languages, to save the Sacred Body of Jesus.

One night, lying in bed with a high fever, she found herself transported to a house in Germany. She rang the doorbell and asked in German – a language she did not know – for the lady of the house, without yet knowing what Jesus’ will was with the visit. The words came to her lips at just the right moment.6

“I came to get the Host that you keep at home. Jesus Himself told me, and I came from France just to get it.”

To verify if she was really telling the truth, the woman spoke to her in French. Yvonne responded naturally, leaving her speechless with astonishment. After composing herself, she asked the young mystic to leave, but the latter was quicker: informed by Our Lord that the consecrated Host was in a glass cabinet, inside a small box, she ran to retrieve it.

Realizing she had been discovered, the woman rushed to grab the key to the cabinet, but it flew into Yvonne’s hands, who recovered the Host and pressed it to her chest. Fleeing the attacks of the profaner, she ran out of the house and began walking through the streets, until she lost consciousness and found herself back in her bed, fast asleep.

A sacrilegious priest

Besides these touching rescues, Providence also entrusted Yvonne with other missions, intended to benefit certain souls.

Mother Madeleine, superior of the Malestroit convent, recounts: “We witnessed the death of a wicked priest in Yvonne’s cell.”7 The bilocation, however, had a peculiarity: the nun had been transported to Paris, to be with the dying man, and he seemed to be in her body and spoke through her lips. Mother Madeleine, thus seeing the priest’s gestures and hearing his words, was able to follow what was happening in the French capital.

Yvonne already knew this priest, for in other circumstances she had rescued Hosts that the unfortunate man had been consecrating in black Masses for nine years. To prevent the rescue, the sacrilegious priest had even tried to kill her!… This time, however, she had been sent to prevent his eternal damnation.

Distraught, the dying man gasped: “I am a criminal… I consecrated to do sacrilege for nine years… Oh, those Black Masses!… For mockery … What sacrilege!” Yvonne inspired him with words of mercy, but he claimed to hate God and excused himself, assuring her that there was no priest nearby to hear his Confession, as he would die in a few minutes. The young mystic continued trying to calm him, speaking to him of God’s infinite clemency, capable of forgiving any sins through sincere repentance and a firm purpose of amendment. The struggle was arduous, and it seemed that the wretch would succumb to the temptation of despair and final impenitence when, at the last instant, he managed to stammer: “Forgive me, my God!” Then he expired.

Yvonne then recovered consciousness. A few minutes later, she had an ecstasy and saw the priest burning in the flames of Purgatory.

“Heaven visited the earth”

One of the most impressive events in Yvonne’s life occurred on September 16, 1941.8 She was visiting Fr. Paul Labutte, her confessor and his relatives at the relatives home in La Brardière. While she was taking photographs in the garden, they suddenly heard the nun exclaim in dismay.

Fr. Paul came without delay and heard her cry: “Oh! The Host! They are desecrating it! They are piercing it with a stiletto! Oh! It is bleeding!” It was a sacrilege perpetrated in Paris. Yvonne then addressed her Guardian Angel, whom she called Lumen, and said to him: “I want that Host… Lumen, go and get Jesus!”

At that moment, Fr. Paul recounts, they saw something white passing over the top of a large oak tree: it was a Host carried by a ray of light, descending gently towards a young pine tree. They ran and found the Host on a branch just below the top of the tree, within reach. It was small, like those distributed to the faithful, and it was pierced in the middle, with a little blood flowing from the perforation. After a few minutes of silence and adoration, Yvonne-Aimée went for her camera and photographed the Host. Then she placed it on a green leaf, held by Father Paul like a corporal, on which the Host remained upright… This was recorded in a second photograph.

Finally, the Host was taken to a rustic cabin that served as an oratory and placed at the feet of an image of Our Lady.9 At some point, the candles around the image lit by themselves, without human intervention. And shortly afterwards Yvonne and Fr. Paul saw a mysterious inscription appear, letter by letter, above the door: “Heaven visited the earth,” which was also photographed.

Let us repay love with love!

The life of Yvonne-Aimée, marked by numerous mystical phenomena and especially devoted to the Blessed Sacrament, was filled with other beautiful occurrences too numerous to relate in this brief article.

The few we have just meditated on, however, show us well the immensity of the love of Our Lord Jesus Christ for us. Not even the knowledge of the horrors that would be committed throughout history against the Sacrament of the Altar were able to dissuade Him from the determination to remain with us until the end of the world, in the Sacred Species!

Let us, then, repay love with love. May our boundless gratitude and our burning love repair the coldness, indifference, and outrages committed against the Blessed Sacrament. ²

Notes:

1 Cf. LAURENTIN, René; MAHÉO, Patrick. Bilocations de Mère Yvonne-Aimée. Étude critique en référence à ses missions. 2.ed. Paris: François-Xavier de Guibert, 2010, p.9.

2 Ibid., p.14.

3 Cf. LABUTTE, Paul. Yvonne-Aimée. “Ma mère selon l’Esprit”. 2.ed. Paris: François-Xavier de Guibert, 1997, p.204-205.

4 LAURENTIN, René. Biographie d’Yvonne-Aimée de Malestroit (1901-1951). 3.ed. Paris: François-Xavier de Guibert, 2010, v.II, p.141.

5 Ibid.

6 Cf. LAURENTIN; MAHÉO, op. cit., p.15-16.

7 Ibid., p.25.

8 Cf. LABUTTE, op. cit., p.538-540.

9 It was a contemporary replica of the Virgin of the Smile, of St. Therese of the Child Jesus.