[4][5] A file of documents supporting Robin's beatification was submitted to the diocesan authorities in 1987, and transmitted to the Vatican in 1996.

[7] Marthe Robin was born into a peasant farming family on 13 March 1902 in Châteauneuf-de-Galaure (Drôme, France),[8] in a hamlet called Les Moillés, which was locally known as "La Plaine".

Her personality is described by some witness as being "a happy young girl, open to the future, helpful, and sometimes mischievous...".

[9] In spite of the fact that her parents were non-practicing Catholics,[10] Marthe was drawn to prayer at an early age.

[13] Her mobility problems, combined with hypersensitivity to light obliged her to become a recluse in a dark bedroom.

[14] She may have been suffering from lethargic encephalitis,[15] also called von Economo disease, an inflammatory infection of the nervous system.

[17][18][19] The testimonies of friends and family, priests, bishops and lay people who met her are recorded in the diocesan enquiry (1986–1996), and on the basis of this Bernard Peyrou, Postulator of the Cause for Beatification has written a biography of Robin.

On 25 March 1922, according to the testimony of her sister Alice, Robin had a personal vision of the Virgin Mary.

She confided about this vision to Père Faure, her parish priest, then took the decision to give her life entirely to God and to unite herself with his sufferings through prayer and love.

[36] In the same year, Père Faure, Robin's parish priest, became her spiritual director, a role that he did not relish because he could not personally relate to mystical experience.

[37] In 1936, Marthe Robin met Georges Finet, a priest from Lyon who took over Père Faure's role.

The following day, at about 5 a.m., when Père Finet went into her room, he found Robin unconscious on the floor, near her bed.

It is estimated that, in fifty years, she individually met more than 100,000 people, including hundreds of priests and many bishops.

Rather, she asked questions, made suggestions, prevented visitors from going off the subject, and let them reach their own conclusions.

[50][51] The number of visitors going to pray at the farmhouse on La Plaine, where Robin lived, doubled between 2001 and 2011, reaching 40,000 a year.

[58][60] A decree of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints dated 24 April 1998 agreed that the diocesan inquiry was valid.

The Positio, a summary of 2000 pages of the beatification file which lays out the results of the diocesan inquiry was sent on 6 May 2010 for study to a commission of theologians, a meeting of whom was held on 11 December 2012.

[61][62][63] The "heroic virtues" of Marthe Robin were recognized on 7 November 2014 by Pope Francis (Press release of the French Bishops).

The philosopher Jean Guitton claimed that Robin was offered the possibility of medical analysis at a clinic for several months in order to prove to sceptics that her apparent inability to eat was not some elaborate hoax, but she declined, saying "Do you really think that will convince people?

Guitton deplored that "in this present era, prudence requires us to suppose that such phenomena can only be explained by autosuggestion, hysteria, or mental illness rather than by a noble and transcendent cause."

Some scientific sceptics consider that her mystical manifestations, particularly her long fast, were simply an elaborate hoax,[65] but numerous doctors at the time ruled out this possibility[66] and others have diagnosed it as hysteria.