He was a Man of God (II)

After his conversion, Edmond Fricoteaux conceived the idea of showing his gratitude to the Blessed Virgin. He felt that God had a project, which was constantly in his prayers: to build a monumental statue for the glory of his Mother near a major throughway. Providence placed him on an airplane next to famous mariologist Father Rene Laurentin, who encouraged him: "You will need the consent of the local bishop, the support of a religious congregation and - this is very important - the Blessed Virgin will have to show her Child." The bishop was found in the Diocese of Pontoise and Edmond secured the help of the Congregation of the Servants of Jesus and Mary (Serviteurs de Jésus et de Marie) founded by Father Lamy at Ourscamps in the Oise. All he needed now was the statue! Edmond imagined a statue like the one at the Rue du Bac surrounded by 12 stars. It needed to be 7 meters high to be seen by all. He was busy calling sculptors for estimates when Antoine Legrand, contacted by mistake, surprised him by saying: "The statue already exists! It is called Our Lady of France (Notre-Dame de France). Edmond was dumbfounded. He discovered that she had stood on top of the Pontifical Pavilion at the World Fair in Paris in 1937. The statue had remained there one year for the third centennial anniversary of the vow of King Louis the 13th. It is exactly 7 meters high, and the Virgin carries the Child in her arms and wears a crown of 12 stars! The French newspaper La Croix of November 2, 1938 reported about the astonishing vow of the Archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Verdier, "that the luminous statue Notre-Dame de France, which so magnificently stood on top of the Pontifical Pavilion that has now become the Marian Pavilion must not be disappear into oblivion. It should be erected on a hill near Paris as a counterpart to the Sacred Heart (Sacré-Coeur) of Montmartre." A subscription was immediately launched, but then stopped by the war in 1939, and eventually forgotten after the death of the cardinal in 1945. Edmond went in search of the statue that he managed to find and extract, with great difficulties, from the basement of the communist city hall of Amiens. He was able to have the statue repaired, requiring 2000 hours of work by a master locksmith. After many impediments and acts of Providence, he finally had the statue installed in Baillet-en-France, 18 km north of Paris, starting from nothing yet managing to bring 52,000 people, 25,000 subscribers, 7 bishops, and the Nuncio and the Cardinal Lustiger in just a few months to the blessing of the statue, which took place on October 15, 1988 almost 50 years to the day after Cardinal Verdier's vow.