News of this miracle spread and soon the crowds of people began flocking to the college looking for Brother Andre to pray with them. Demand for the “oil of St. Joseph” increased rapidly. His superiors and members of the college staff were worried by the crowds coming to see the doorman.
Brother Andre had a strong desire to see a shrine built to St. Joseph on Mouth Royal. He placed a statue of St. Joseph on the mountainside, and then, in 1904 a small chapel, the Oratory of St. Joseph, opened its doors. Today beside the chapel stands a magnificent basilica.
One day as he was scrubbing the floor at the college, a lady approached him being supported by two men. She told him she suffered so much from rheumatism that she was unable to walk without assistance. Without looking up Brother Andre told the men to let her walk, and she walked away without their help.
He swept the halls and stairways, delivered the mail, handled the laundry, lit the lamps, and carried wood for the fireplaces. And he was nurse to them all. Brother Andre was moved with compassion for the sick and petitioned St. Joseph, to whom he had a special devotion, to intercede before God for those who were in need of healing.
He collected oil from the lamps burning in the sanctuary and poured the oil into small bottles to use when he prayed for the sick. He brought some that were sick up to his tiny room to nurse them and pray for them. He anointed them with the oil he had collected and urged them to pester St. Joseph for a cure. One night, one of the brothers at the college called Brother Andre to anoint his gangrenous leg with oil after the doctor had told him they were considering amputation. The next morning the leg was healed.
On another occasion, he noticed a man with a worried expression in the crowd of people coming through the door. When he found out the man was concerned about his wife who had been sick in bed for many years, he told him, “But she is not so sick as you think. At this very moment she became better.” Not really believing that to be true, the man returned home to find his wife perfectly healthy and in good spirits. She got out of bed at the very time Brother André had pronounced the words, “At this very moment, she became better.”
Cures have even been reported after his death in 1937 at the age of 91. Paul-Andre Cloutier had already suffered six heart attacks and three by-pass surgeries, when he was told his arteries were again 98 percent blocked. He prayed to Brother Andre for help. The night before a scheduled heart catheritization he suddenly felt what he described as a “warm glowing feeling going from my feet to the top of my head.” He says he knew in that moment he had been cured. “I jumped off the bed and started to do a jig all around the room,” he says. The catheritization revealed that his arteries were completely open. Mr. Cloutier says, “This time last year I wasn't able to climb up three steps without chest pain and now I'm walking two miles a day. And I haven't had a twinge since.”
Recognizing the need of the people, they gave Brother Andre permission to treat the crowds at the tram station in town. For 8 years he spent long hours there, returning late at night, after the last tram had gone, to finish his duties at the college.
People came by the thousands to the oratory for the prayers of this humble porter who touched the heart of God. Through his intercession, many were healed.
Alfred Bessette entered the Congregation of Holy Cross in Montreal, Canada, at the age of 25 and took the name “Brother Andre.” All of his life he suffered from a stomach ailment which prevented him from getting an education and holding down a job. Unsure of what to do with him, his superiors gave him the most menial of tasks, porter of the college of Notre Dame, where he faithfully served for 40 years.
An infant was healed of a brain tumor when Brother Andre gently stroked the child's head. And a man's severely infected hand was immediately cured when touched by Brother Andre.
Hundreds of discarded crutches and canes line the walls of St. Joseph's Oratory as a testimony to the thousands of people who reported they were healed when Brother Andre, the humble doorman, prayed for them.
At this very moment she became better.
He anointed them with the oil he had collected and urged them to pester St. Joseph for a cure.
