Jean-Pierre Bély was an intensive care nurse who began to experience profound tiredness in his mid-thirties and in his late forties was diagnosed with MS and became wheelchair-bound. Friends and family suggested he go on pilgrimage to Lourdes. He was reluctant but was persuaded at the age of 51.
As he lay on his stretcher for the Blessed Sacrament procession, he remembers feeling great pain in his body which he described in his diary as like lying on pebbles. He remembers as well that he did not ask for healing but he told God, ‘God, because you are all powerful, you can give me everything; as you know me better than I know myself, you will give me what is best.’
As he was lying there, a beautiful woman in white approached him and he was surprised to notice no one around him could see her. She said to him ‘be confident, Mother Mary will put everything right’.
He began that afternoon to feel sensation in his hands and feet. That night as he lay asleep in bed, he felt someone touch him. When he opened his eyes, there was no one there, but he heard an interior voice say ‘get up and walk’. With the help of the night nurse, he took his first steps in years. When he went back to bed, he could not sleep another second. He prayed the Rosary more intensely than ever before, telling Our Lady after each Hail Mary, 'Mother Mary I love you so much'.
The next day, he was leaving Lourdes. He allowed himself to be wheeled to the train because he was afraid of shocking people if he told them he was cured. He decided to walk on to the train and sit down but could not find a seat! Then he went to walk through some carriages and he heard a woman remark, ’that man was on a stretcher yesterday and now he’s walking!’
When his wife met him at the station, he allowed her to wheel him to the car, but when they arrived at the house, he told her he did not need the chair and walked straight up into the house. His family were amazed and deeply moved. Even more amazed were the villagers when they saw him cycling around the village, walking into the shops and climbing ladders.
Many villagers returned to the practice of the faith on account of his miraculous cure. He and his family developed a profound devotion to Our Lady. He enjoyed 21 years more of good health until he was sadly diagnosed with liver cancer, but he was serene in his illness, telling people, 'the fact that I was cured does not mean I am protected more than anyone else'.