TO Bernadette: “Did the ‘Lady’ say anything to you?”
Bernadette: “Yes, from time to time, Our Lady says Penance, Penance, Penance. Pray for sinners”.
By Penance, one must understand conversion. For the Church, conversion consists of turning one’s heart towards God and towards our brothers and sisters, as Christ taught us.
THE APPARITIONS:
Thursday 11 February 1858: THE FIRST MEETING.
Accompanied by her sister and a friend, Bernadette went to Massabielle, prior to crossing the stream, she heard a noise like a gust of wind, she looked up towards the Grotto: “I saw a lady dressed in white, she wore a white dress, and equally white veils, a blue belt and a yellow rose on each foot.” Bernadette made the Sign of the Cross and said the Rosary with the Lady. When the prayer ended the Lady suddenly vanished.
Sunday 14th February 1858: HOLY WATER.
Bernadette felt an inner force drawing her to the Grotto. At her insistence, her mother allowed her. After the first decade of the Rosary, she saw the same Lady appear. She sprinkled Holy Water at her. The Lady smiled and bent her head. When the Rosary ended, she disappeared.
Thursday 18th February 1858: THE LADY SPEAKS.
For the 1st time, the Lady spoke. Bernadette held out a pen and paper asking her to write her name. She replied “It is not necessary” and she added: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world but in the other. Would you be kind enough to come here for a fortnight?”
Friday 19th February 1858: THE FIRST CANDLE.
Bernadette came to the Grotto with a lighted blessed candle. This was later the practice that followed.
Saturday 20th February 1858: IN SILENCE.
The Lady taught her a personal prayer. At the end of the vision Bernadette is overcome with a great sadness.
Sunday 21st February 1858: "AQUERO".
The Lady appeared to Bernadette early that morning and 100 people were present. The Police Commissioner, Jacomet, questioned her on what she saw. Bernadette only spoke of “AQUÉRO-that thing” in local dialect)
Tuesday 23rd February 1858: THE SECRET.
Surrounded by 150 persons, Bernadette arrived at the Grotto. The Apparition-a secret “only for her”.
Wednesday 24th February 1858: "PENANCE"
The message of the Lady: “Penance! Penance! Penance! Pray to God for sinners. Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners!”
Thursday 25th February 1858: SPRING!
300 people were present. Bernadette relates; “She told me to go, drink of the spring (….) I only found a little muddy water. At the fourth attempt I was able to drink. She also made me eat the bitter herbs that were found near the spring, and then the vision left and went away.” In front of the crowd that was asking “Do you think that she is mad doing things like that?” she replied; “It is for sinners.”
Saturday 27th February 1858: SILENCE.
800 people were present. There was silence. Bernadette drank the water from the spring and carried out her usual acts of Penance.
Sunday 28th February 1858: THE ECSTASY.
Over 1000 people were present at the ecstasy. Bernadette prayed, kissed the ground and moved on her knees as a sign of Penance. She was then taken to the house of Judge Ribes who threatened to put her in prison.
Monday 1st March 1858: THE FIRST MIRACLE.
Over 1500 people assembled and for the first time among them, a Priest. In the night, Catherine Latapie, a woman from Loubajac, 7kms away, went to the Grotto, she plunged her dislocated arm into the water of the spring: her arm and her hand regained their movement.
Tuesday 2nd March 1858: MESSAGE TO THE PRIESTS.
The crowd keeps growing in numbers. The Lady asks Bernadette: “Go and tell the Priests that people are to come here in procession and to build a chapel here.” Bernadette spoke of this to Fr. Peyramale, the Parish Priest of Lourdes. He wanted to know the Lady’s name. He demanded another test; to see the wild rose bush flower at the Grotto in the middle of winter.
Wednesday 3rd March 1858: A SMILE!
At 7 o’clock in the morning, in the presence of 3000 people, Bernadette arrived at the Grotto, but the vision did not appear! After school, she heard the inner invitation of the Lady. She went to the Grotto and asked her again for her name. The response was a smile. The Parish Priest told her again: “If the Lady really wishes that a chapel be built, then she must tell us her name and make the rose bush bloom at the Grotto.”
Thursday 4th March 1858: 8,000 AT THE GROTTO.
The ever-greater crowd (about 8000 people) waited for a miracle at the end of the fortnight. The vision was silent. Fr. Peyramale stuck to his position. For 20 days Bernadette did not go to the Grotto, she no longer felt the irresistible invitation.
Thursday 25th March 1858: THE NAME!
The vision finally revealed her name, but the wild rose bush, on which she stood during the Apparitions, did not bloom. Bernadette recounted: “She extended her arms towards the ground, then joined them as though in prayer and said Que soy era Immaculada Concepciou (I am the Immaculate Conception)”. She ran all the way, repeating continuously the words that she did not understand. These words troubled the brave Parish Priest. Bernadette was ignorant of the fact that this theological expression was assigned to the Blessed Virgin. Four years earlier, in 1854, Pope Pius IX declared this a truth of the Catholic Faith (a dogma).
Wednesday 7th April 1858: THE MIRACLE-CANDLE.
During this apparition, Bernadette had to keep her candle alight. The flame flickered along her hand without burning it. A medical doctor, Dr. Douzous, witnessed this fact.
Friday 16th July 1858: THE FINAL APPARITION.
Bernadette received the mysterious call to the Grotto, but her way was blocked and closed off by a barrier. She thus arrived across from the Grotto to the other side of the Gave. “I felt that I was in front of the Grotto, at the same distance as before, I saw only the Blessed Virgin, and she was more beautiful than ever!”
The 18 apparitions took place between 11th February - 16th July 1858.
And on 28th July 1858, Bishop Laurence of Lourdes launched a Commission of Enquiry into the supposed apparitions of The Virgin Mary at the Grotto of Massabielle: “to collect and to ascertain the facts which have happened or which could still occur in or around the grotto of Lourdes, to report them, to highlight their nature, and thus to provide with the components necessary to reach a conclusion”…
The task lasted 4 years, culminating, on 18th January 1862, in a Decree which officially recognized the Apparitions.
In Lourdes, she was Bernadette, the visionary. In Nevers, she became Sister Marie Bernard,
On the day of her Profession, the Bishop declared that her work would be “the work of prayer”.
“Pray for sinners”, the Lady had said.
Bernadette remained faithful to this. “My weapons,” she wrote to the Pope, “are prayer and sacrifice.”
She died at Nevers on 16th April 1879, aged 35. The Church proclaimed her a saint on 8th December 1933.
