Marguerite Bays

Marguerite Bays (8 September 1815 – 27 June 1879) was a Swiss Roman Catholic laywoman who was a member of the Secular Franciscan Order. She worked as a seamstress and also served as a catechist. Bays lived a simple life as a Franciscan, adapting the tenets of the order into her life.
Cured from bowel cancer on 8 December 1854, she took that as a divine sign since it fell on the day that Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of the Immaculate Conception.
After her death in 1879, Pope John Paul II beatified her in 1995 after the recognition of a miracle attributed to her intercession. One final miracle is needed for her to be canonized.

Marguerite Bays was born in Switzerland on 8 September 1815 as the second of seven children to Pierre-Antoine Bays and Josephine Morel Bays. Her siblings were Jean, Mariette, Joseph, Blaise and Seraphine. The family consisted of farmers, and the Bays family was very devout.

An exceptionally intelligent student, she showed a particular inclination towards prayer and decided to cease playing with her peers at school in favor of the silence of prayer. At the age of eight she received Confirmation and received her First Communion at the age of eleven. She was in an apprenticeship as a seamstress at the age of fifteen, and was paid per day.

Despite the urgings of many around her, she dismissed the possibility of becoming a professed religious. Instead, it was her desire to remain single as a virgin in order to devote herself to an austere life for Jesus Christ. After the wedding of her older brother, Bays had to endure hostility from her in-law. The two eventually reconciled on her sister-in-law's deathbed some years later. Attending Mass every Sunday, Bays was known to take part in Eucharistic Adoration following Mass. Bays also embarked on pilgrimages to Marian shrines, sometimes with her friends.

Bays also became a member of the Secular Franciscan Order.

Bays decided to devote her time to teaching catechism to children and regularly visited those who were ill. At the age of 35 in 1853, Bays contracted bowel cancer, and begged the Blessed Virgin Mary to heal her. At the same time, she asked that her pain be linked with the suffering of Christ. On 8 December 1854, when Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, Bays was cured of her illness.

She later found that she had the stigmata at the age of 39, and consulted with her local bishop to verify the authenticity of the stigmata. In addition, she began to fall into ecstatic raptures each Friday when she would feel the pain of Christ. She at first tried to hide the wounds from the outside world, but it eventually slipped and news spread about her stigmata.

She died on 27 June 1879 and her funeral took place on 30 June. Her funeral saw hundreds attend. Her remains were later transferred sometime after her death.

The beatification process commenced in Switzerland in 1929 and closed not long after. Another local process spanned from 1953 to 1955 and the two processes were ratified on 13 December 1985. The Positio was then forwarded to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in Rome in 1986 for further evaluation.

Pope John Paul II approved that she had lived a life of heroic virtue and proclaimed her to be Venerable on 10 July 1990. A miracle was investigated and the process was ratified on 12 April 1991. John Paul II approved it on 23 December 1993 and beatified her on 29 October 1995.

The second miracle needed for her canonization was investigated and the process closed on 27 May 2014. The documents on the miracle were submitted to Rome.