Sentence:  To this <WSD>extenuated</WSD> spectre, perhaps, a crumb is not thrown once a year, but when ahungered and athirst to famine—when all humanity has forgotten the dying tenant of a decaying house—Divine Mercy remembers the mourner ... 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  To make thin or slender; to draw out so as to lessen the thickness.