This framework is not simply a distortion of the historical reality.

Marguerite herself was a Catholic woman of her time, and it is entirely plausible that she experienced her survival within exactly this framework — as divine testing, as an ordeal that her faith sustained her through, as evidence of a Providence that chose to preserve her for reasons she might not fully understand.

The accounts that emphasize the practical dimensions — the gun, the bears, the skins for warmth — exist alongside the accounts that emphasize faith, and both can be true simultaneously.

A person can pray for divine assistance and also shoot a bear.