Therese Neumann

Therese Neumann (9 April 1898–18 September 1962) was a German Catholic mystic and stigmatic who professed to have consumed no food other than The Holy Eucharist, nor to have drunk any water from 1926 until her death.

She was born in the village of Konnersreuth in Bavaria, Germany, where she lived all her life. She was born into a large family with little income, and later became a member of the Third Order of St. Francis. Neumann was a revered religious figure of the 20th century, but claims of miracles in her life have also been subject to intense scrutiny and criticism by physicians and skeptics.

Therese Neumann CREDIT: Bundesarchiv, Bild 102-00241 / Ferdinand Neumann - Bild urheberrechtlich geschützt / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE, via Wikimedia Commons

Suffering and healing

On 11 March 1918, Neumann was partially paralyzed after falling off a stool while attending to a fire in her uncle's barn. She sustained more falls and injuries during this period. After one particular fall she claimed to have lost much of her eyesight, and in 1919 she claimed to have been blinded completely. Bedridden, she reportedly developed severe bed sores that sometimes exposed bone. She reported that her eyesight was restored on 29 April 1923, the day Therese of Lisieux was beatified in Rome. Neumann had been praying novenas in advance of this day. On 17 May 1925, Therese of Lisieux was fully canonized as a saint in the Catholic Church. Therese Neumann said the saint called to her and then cured her of her paralysis and bed sores.

On 7 November 1925, Neumann took to her bed again, and on 13 November was diagnosed with appendicitis. According to her account, while prepared for surgery she convulsed violently and stared at the ceiling finally saying, "Yes." She asked her family to take her to the church to pray immediately. She then announced that she had been cured of all traces of appendicitis.

Skeptics have vigorously disputed Neumann's claims of miraculous cures, as well as those from eyewitness reports.

Stigmata

Therese would later apparently develop the stigmata. She said that on 5 March 1926, the first Friday of Lent, a wound had appeared slightly above her heart, but that she had kept this secret. However, she did report a vision of Jesus at Mount of Olives with three Apostles.

On 12 March, she said she had another vision of Christ at the Mount of Olives, along with the crowning of thorns. She also claimed that the wound above her heart reappeared on this day, and she spoke to her sister about it. She claimed the wound also reappeared on Friday of the following week. By 26 March, she was claiming the same wound accompanied by a vision of Christ bearing the cross and a similar wound on her left hand. Blood was observed on her clothing, and she no longer attempted to keep the information to herself.

On Good Friday, Neumann, according to her own testimony witnessed the entire Passion of Christ in her visions. She displayed wounds on her hands and feet accompanied by blood apparently coming from her eyes. Blood poured from the wounds.

On Easter Sunday, she claimed a vision of the resurrection of Christ. For several consecutive Fridays after that, she stated she was experiencing the Passion of Christ, apparently suffering in her own body along with all his historic agonies. She claimed to have especially suffered the Passion on Good Friday each year.

On 22–23 March 1928, Neumann's stigmata claims were investigated at her home by a group of observers including bishops and physicians.

Non-eating

From 1923 until her death in 1962, Therese Neumann professed to have consumed no food other than The Holy Eucharist, nor to have drunk any water from 1926 until her death.

Montague Summers in his book The Physical Phenomena of Mysticism speaks of her supposedly supernatural ability to survive for long periods without food or water.

In July 1927, Neumann's claims of sustaining her physical body without material nutrition (inedia) were examined at her house. She was physically examined and tested by the physician Otto Seidl and four Franciscan nurses, for fifteen days (July 14 to 28). Neumann was observed not to have eaten anything, alhough this short period of observation did not prove that she was able to live long periods without food or drink.

Death and other information

During some of her Friday trances, she would utter phrases identified by witnesses as ancient Aramaic. She was also said to have been able to understand Hebrew, Greek, and Latin.

Paramhansa Yogananda visited her in 1935 and wrote about her case in his book Autobiography of a Yogi, published in 1946. He wrote an entire chapter, "Therese Neumann, The Catholic Stigmatist of Bavaria", which reverently gives a vivid first-hand description of one of her Friday Passion trances.

On 18 September 1962, Therese Neumann died from cardiac arrest, after having suffered from angina pectoris for some time.

The Roman Catholic Church has neither confirmed nor denied the inedia, nor her stigmata. The "Resl", as she is colloquially known, nonetheless attained a place in popular piety; a petition asking for her beatification was signed by 40,000 people. In 2005, Gerhard Ludwig Müller, Bishop of Regensburg, formally opened the Vatican proceedings for her beatification.

Attribution

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