Marthe Robin's Fifty-Year Inedia

Marthe Robin (1902–1981) was a French lay mystic who founded the Foyers de Charité movement. Paralyzed and bedridden from around 1928, she reportedly ceased eating and drinking entirely from approximately 1930 onward, sustained solely by weekly reception of the Eucharist.

The Inedia Claim

Robin never agreed to supervised clinical testing of her inedia claim. When an offer of hospital-based monitoring was made — one that could have provided definitive evidence — she declined. This refusal is the central evidential problem: unlike Therese Neumann, who at least submitted to a flawed 15-day observation, Robin never underwent even that degree of scrutiny.

Posthumous Investigation

Carmelite scholar Conrad de Meester, after extensive investigation, concluded that Robin was a 'mystical fraud.' His findings have been disputed by Robin's supporters and by the Foyers de Charité community, but have not been formally refuted. The FSSPX and other traditionalist Catholic sources have also expressed serious skepticism.

Church Status

The cause for Robin's beatification was opened in 2014. No miracles have been officially authenticated, and the Vatican has not ruled on her mystical claims. The beatification process itself does not constitute authentication of inedia or stigmata.