Our Lady of Lourdes

Our Lady of Lourdes
© Cecilia Lawrence
February 7th 2018
8 x 10 inches
Ink, watercolor, gold leaf

“Arise, my love, my fair one,
   and come away.
O my dove, in the clefts of the rock,
   in the covert of the cliff,
let me see your face,
   let me hear your voice;
for your voice is sweet,
   and your face is beautiful.”
~ Song of Songs 2:13-14

“Que soy era Immaculada Councepciou.”
“I am the Immaculate Conception.”
~ Our Lady of Lourdes to St. Bernadette

This is my image of Our Lady of Lourdes, based on the description given by St. Bernadette Soubirous when Our Lady first appeared to her at the Grotto at Massabielle near Lourdes, France. Bernadette described the Virgin Mary as a young girl—about sixteen or seventeen—wearing a long white dress girded with a long blue sash. Over her head was a long white veil that feel down almost to her feet. On each foot was a golden rose and hanging on her right arm was a white-beaded rosary with a golden chain. She appeared in a bright golden cloud in a niche of the Grotto over a bush of wild roses.

Since it was at Lourdes that the Virgin Mary proclaimed that she was the Immaculate Conception, I have also used additional imagery associated with that title, including presenting Our Lady standing on the moon, surrounded by a golden nimbus, with a halo of twelve stars about her head, as a reference to the Book of Revelations: “And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (Revelations 12:1). I have also added the words “Que soy era Immaculada Councepciou” (“I am the Immaculate Conception” in Bernadette’s native Bigourdan dialect) around her halo.



:+: A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE APPARITION AT LOURDES :+:

On Thursday, February 11th 1858, fourteen-year-old Bernadette Soubirous, along with her younger sister Toinette and her friend Jeanne Abadie, left town to collect firewood for Bernadette’s family, since they were poor and the winter was very cold. The other girls had crossed the river Gave when Bernadette, reluctant to catch a cold, hesitated to cross. Seeing how there was no other way over, she sat down to take off her shoes and stockings to wade through the water after her friends. She later recounted:

“I went on taking my stockings off, and was putting one foot into the water, when I heard the same sound in front of me. I looked up and saw a cluster of branches and brambles underneath the topmost opening in the grotto tossing and swaying to and fro, though nothing else stirred all around.

Behind these branches and within the opening, I saw immediately afterwards a Girl in white, no bigger than myself, who greeted me with a slight bow of the head; at the same time, she stretched out her arms slightly away from her body, opening her hands, as in pictures of Our Lady; over her right arm hung a rosary.

I was afraid. I stepped back. I wanted to call the two little girls, but I didn't have the courage to do so. I rubbed my eyes again and again: I thought I must be mistaken.

Raising my eyes again, I saw the Girl smiling at me most graciously and seeming to invite me to come nearer. But I was still afraid. It was not however a fear such as I have had at other times, for I would have stayed there for ever looking at her: whereas, when you are afraid, you run away quickly.

Then I thought of saying my prayers. I put my hand in my pocket. I took out the rosary I usually carry on me. I knelt down and I tried to make the sign of the Cross, but I could not lift my hand to my forehead: it fell back.

The Girl meanwhile stepped to one side and turned towards me. This time, she was holding the large beads in her hand. She crossed herself as though to pray. My hand was trembling. I tried again to make the sign of the Cross, and this time I could. After that I was not afraid.

I said my Rosary. The young girl slipped the beads of hers through her fingers, but she was not moving her lips.

While I was praying my Rosary, I was watching as hard as I could. She was wearing a white dress reaching down to her feet, of which only the toes appeared. The dress was gathered very high at the neck by a hem from which hung a white cord. A white veil covered her head and came down over her shoulders and arms almost to the bottom of her dress. On each foot I saw a yellow rose. The sash of the dress was blue, and hung down below her knees. The chain of the Rosary was yellow; the beads white, big and widely spaced. The Girl was alive, very young and surrounded with light. When I had finished my Rosary, she bowed to me smilingly. She retired within the niche and disappeared all of a sudden.”

Bernadette resumed taking off her stockings, and asked her friends if they had seen anything. They said no, so Bernadette said nothing, as she supposed she might have been seeing things. But then the two girls kept pestering her and asking her what she had seen, so she told them and made them promise not to tell anyone. When they arrived home, they said that Bernadette had seen a Lady dressed in white.

Her mother and father forbade her to go back to the Grotto, but Bernadette felt impelled to go back. At least, on Sunday after Mass, Bernadette asked her mother if she could go, and her mother relented. Her father said he supposed there was no harm in a Lady carrying a Rosary. Bernadette brought holy water with her, and as she knelt down and began praying the Rosary, the Lady appeared again. Bernadette sprinkled her with holy water and told the Girl that if she was from God she could stay but if she wasn’t she must go away. The Lady only smiled sweetly and bowed. After they finished their Rosary, she disappeared.

On February 18th 1858, the following Thursday, Bernadette went back to the Grotto with some adults who brought paper and ink with them. When the Lady appeared, Bernadette asked her if she had anything she wanted to say, and if so, would she have the goodness to put it down on paper? The Lady smiled and said that it wasn’t necessary to write it down, but instead asked Bernadette to come back to the Grotto for a fortnight. Bernadette said she would, and then the Lady said, “I do not promise to make you happy in this life but in the next.”

Beginning the next day, Friday, February 19th, Bernadette came to the Grotto every day for two weeks. The Lady appeared everyday except for one Monday and one Friday. She made the request that Bernadette was to tell the priests to build a chapel there at the Grotto. The Lady confided certain secrets to her and told her to pray for sinners and to wash in the spring that gushed up from the Grotto. About the Lady, Bernadette said: “When I see her I feel as if I'm no longer of this world. And when the vision disappears I'm amazed to find myself still here.” People began to flock to the Grotto, first out of curiosity and with scornful skepticism, but later with deep respect and awe at the serenity and deep peace that emanated from Bernadette when she came to the Grotto.

On Thursday, February 25th 1858, the Lady told Bernadette to drink at the fountain and wash herself. As Bernadette later recalled:

“[The Lady] told me that I should go and drink at the fountain and wash myself. Seeing no fountain I went to drink at the Gave. She said it was not there; she pointed with her finger that I was to go in under the rock. I went, and I found a puddle of water which was more like mud, and the quantity was so small that I could hardly gather a little in the hollow of my hand. Nevertheless I obeyed, and started scratching the ground; after doing that I was able to take some. The water was so dirty that three times I threw it away. The fourth time I was able to drink it. She made me eat grass growing in the same place where I had drunk; once only; I do not know why. Then the Vision disappeared and I went home.”

Seeing Bernadette covered in mud and eating grass like an animal, people began to scoff at her and dismissed her as a madwoman. Her aunt slapped her and angrily hauled her home as the onlookers jeered.

Disheartened, Bernadette returned to the Grotto the next day and discovered the pure crystal water was flowing the spring she had dug up. Soon, miraculous cures began taking place, which brought large crowds back to the Grotto over the course of the next few days. On Monday, March 1st, a woman from a neighboring village named Catherine Latapie bathed her paralyzed arm in the spring and was miraculously cured. The next day, the Lady (whom Bernadette merely referred to as “Aquero” as she did not know her name) said: “Go and tell the priest to build a chapel here and to have people come in procession.” Bernadette knew the Lady meant Fr. Peyramale, and went to him to deliver her message. The priest didn’t believe her and sent her away angrily. That same day, she came again to deliver her message, and Fr. Peyramale questioned her in front of the other priests. There was disagreement among the priests as to what to do, so finally Fr. Peyramale simply said: “If the lady wants her chapel, let her tell you her name, and ask her to make the rosebush at the grotto flower.” The next day, Bernadette did as the priest requested and asked the lady her name, but she only smiled. That was the end of the fortnight visits.

For the next few weeks, Bernadette went to school and prepared for her first communion. Finally, on Thursday, March 25th 1858, she again felt impelled to return to the Grotto. She didn’t know if this was to be the last time she ever saw the Lady again, so when the Lady appeared, Bernadette was determined to obtain the Lady’s name for Fr. Peyramale. Bernadette wrote:

“I went every day for a fortnight, and each day I asked her who she was–and this petition always made her smile. After the fortnight I asked her three times consecutively. She always smiled. At last I tried for the fourth time. She stopped smiling. With her arms down, she raised her eyes to heaven and then, folding her hands over her breast she said, 'I am the Immaculate Conception.' Then I went back to M. le Curé [Fr. Peyramale] to tell him that she had said she was the Immaculate Conception, and he asked was I absolutely certain. I said yes, and so as not to forget the words, I had repeated them all the way home.”

The priest was shocked, and said, “You are mistaken. Do you know what that means?” Bernadette didn’t, and only later found out that it was a title of the Virgin Mary’s. The doctrine had only been dogmatically defined by Pope Pius IX four years earlier. Fr. Peyramale wrote to the bishop, saying, “She could never have invented this…”

On Wednesday, April 7th, 1858, Bernadette was at the Grotto praying when Dr. Dozous went to her side and witnessed a remarkable thing as he later wrote:

“Bernadette seemed to be even more absorbed than usual in the Appearance upon which her gaze was riveted. I witnessed, as did also every one else there present, the fact which I am about to narrate. She was on her knees saying with fervent devotion the prayers of her Rosary which she held in her left hand while in her right was a large blessed candle, alight. The child was just beginning to make the usual ascent on her knees when suddenly she stopped and, her right hand joining her left, the flame of the big candle passed between the fingers of the latter. Though fanned by a fairly strong breeze, the flame produced no effect upon the skin which it was touching. Astonished at this strange fact, I forbade anyone there to interfere, and taking my watch in my hand, I studied the phenomenon attentively for a quarter of an hour. At the end of this time Bernadette, still in her ecstasy, advanced to the upper part of the Grotto, separating her hands. The flame thus ceased to touch her left hand. Bernadette finished her prayer and the splendor of the transfiguration left her face. She rose and was about to quit the Grotto when I asked her to show me her left hand. I examined it most carefully, but could not find the least trace of burning anywhere upon it. I then asked the person who was holding the candle to light it again and give it to me. I put it several times in succession under Bernadette's left hand but she drew it away quickly, saying 'You are burning me!'. I record this fact just as I have seen it without attempting to explain it. Many persons who were present at the time can confirm what I have said.”

For the last time, on Friday, July 16th 1858, Bernadette was drawn to the Grotto. It had been barricaded by the authorities, but Bernadette still saw the Lady and said good-bye to her.

Twelve days the end of the apparitions, Bishop Laurence of Tarbes appointed a commission to look into the events at Lourdes. For three and a half years witnesses were officially examined and interrogated, miraculous cures were written down to the most painstaking detail, and eminent doctors were called upon to examine the patients who had been cured. Finally, on January 18th 1862, Bishop Laurence wrote: “We are inspired by the Commission comprising wise, holy, learned and experienced priests who questioned the child, studied the facts, examined everything and weighed all the evidence. We have also called on science, and we remain convinced that the Apparitions are supernatural and divine, and that by consequence, what Soubirous saw was the Most Blessed Virgin. Our convictions are based on the testimony of Soubirous, but above all on the things that have happened, things which can be nothing other than divine intervention” and “We judge that Mary Immaculate, Mother of God, really appeared to Bernadette on the 11th of February 1858…” A chapel was soon constructed for the pilgrims that flocked that, and in 1864 a sculptor from Lyons named Joseph-Hugues Fabisch was commissioned to carve a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes from Bernadette’s description. When the artist presented it to Bernadette, she said simply, “No, it is not her.” Fabisch said that her reaction to the statue was the “greatest sorrow of his artistic life.”

Today, the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes is a place of pilgrimage where hundreds of thousands some every year to pray and be healed. Many miraculous healings have taken place along with many conversions. In an encyclical entitled Le pèlerinage de Lourdes, Pope Pius XII wrote this:

“In the school of Mary one can learn to live, not only to give Christ to the world, but also to await with faith the hour of Jesus, and to remain with Mary at the foot of the cross. Wherever providence has placed a person, there is always more to be done for God's cause. Priests should with supernatural confidence, show the narrow road which leads to life. Consecrated and Religious fight under Mary's banner against inordinate lust for freedom, riches, and pleasures. In response to the Immaculate, they will fight with the weapons of prayer and penance and by triumphs of charity. Go to her, you who are crushed by material misery, defenseless against the hardships of life and the indifference of men. Go to her, you who are assailed by sorrows and moral trials. Go to her, beloved invalids and infirm, you who are sincerely welcomed and honored at Lourdes as the suffering members of our Lord. Go to her and receive peace of heart, strength for your daily duties, joy for the sacrifice you offer.”

:+: A Prayer to Our Lady of Lourdes :+:

O ever Immaculate Virgin,
Mother of Mercy,
Health of the Sick,
Refuge of Sinners,
Comfortress of the Afflicted,
You know my wants, my troubles, my sufferings;
Deign to cast upon me a look of Mercy.

By appearing in the grotto of Lourdes
You were pleased to make it
A privileged sanctuary
From where you dispense your favors,
And where many sufferers have obtained
The cure of their infirmities,
Both spiritual and corporal.

I come, therefore,
With unbounded confidence
To implore your maternal intercession.
Obtain, O loving Mother, my requests.
I will endeavor to imitate your virtues,
That I may one day share your glory
And bless you in eternity. Amen.



The Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes is celebrated on February 11th.

Our Lady of Lourdes is the patroness of the ill and infirm.

Grant us, O merciful God, protection in our weakness,
that we, who keep the Memorial of the Immaculate Mother of God,
may, with the help of her intercession,
rise up from our iniquities.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.