Brother André of Mount Royal

Katherine Kurz Burton (c. 1890-1969) was an American social activist, poet and witer who converted to Roman Catholicism and was best known as a religious biographer.

André Bessette, C.S.C. (1845-1937), more commonly known as Brother André, was a lay brother of the Congregation of Holy Cross and a significant figure of the Roman Catholic Church among French-Canadians. Brother Andre was credited with thousands of reported miraculous healings, beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1982, and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010 as St. André of Montreal.

An illustrious visitor from France once asked a high church dignitary of Canada who this Brother Andre was of whom everybody was speaking. "He is a man of God," said the prelate. "At his death we shall behold more than half the population of Montreal hastening to his tomb."

This prophecy was literally fulfilled in January of 1937, when upward of 1,000,000 people paid their last respects to the mortal remains of their friend and benefactor as he lay in state one whole week at the Shrine on Mount Royal which his great devotion to St. Joseph had built. BROTHER ANDRE OF MOUNT ROYAL tells the life story and work of this great apostle of St. Joseph. It shows him as he really lived in constant intercourse with his friend and patron, through whose power he worked, and is still working, his wonders. It is the biography of a humble lay-Brother who saw suffering humanity come to him in ever increasing numbers with its miseries of every description and blessed him for his patience, compassion, understanding and power with God.

The hundreds of crutches and other ex-votos left at the Shrine by invalids whom Brother Andre healed, stand as silent witnesses to the truth of his own words: "When someone does good on earth," he said, "it is nothing compared to what he shall do once he is in heaven." This is a book that should be in every Catholic library and in every Catholic home.