From the desk of the Tar Heel disciple:
February 11, 2026 (#73)
Our Lady of Lourdes- Part I
The optional memorial of Our Lady of Lourdes is celebrated each year on February 11. It is the holy Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, who is celebrated under this title. On this date, in 1858, in a stone grotto adjacent to the River Gave and known by the local community as the Massabielle, only a short distance from the small town of Lourdes in southwestern France, a 14-year-old girl, Bernadette Soubirous, reported that she had seen a beautiful lady dressed in white. The young girl had been in the process of collecting firewood for her family, along with her sister and a local friend. Only Bernadette saw “the lady” on this and 17 other occasions, which concluded on July 16 of the same year. Veneration of the Blessed Virgin under this title rapidly spread throughout the Catholic world and was encouraged by several popes. In 1992, Pope St. John Paul II designated this day as “World Day of the Sick.”
On February 25, 1858, the “lady” Indicated to Bernadette that she was to drink water from a spring. Bernadette thought that she was a drink from the nearby River Gave but the woman dressed in white indicated her to her that she was to look for the spring within the grotto. The girl then dug a hole in a corner of the grotto with her hands which quickly filled with muddy water and from which she drank what she could. This act created great confusion for those who accompanied her on that day. But the flow of water increased with time, and people began to drink and wash with the water from that spring, and many miraculous healings have been reported ever since. Even in our own day, millions of pilgrims visit the grotto and surrounding churches each year, and many of them drink the water and even bathe in baths especially constructed for that purpose. Pilgrims cherish the “Lourdes water” they bring back from the shrine, often sharing it with friends, especially the sick and infirm.
During the apparition on March 25th, the feast of the Annunciation, “the lady” finally identified herself to Bernadette, saying in the local dialect, “I am the Immaculate Conception.” This title of the Virgin Mary was formally promulgated as a dogma of the Catholic Faith by Pope Blessed Pius IX in 1854. It is considered unlikely that Bernadette in her remote corner of France, with only minimal education, would have been aware of that definition and papal promulgation. Nevertheless, it was quickly interpreted by many Catholics as a Divine confirmation of the papal act of infallibility.
Books for adults and for children, as well as numerous devotional items related to Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Bernadette can be found at:
https://inhisname.com/search?options%5Bprefix%5D=last&q=lourdes
