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BernadetteA short number of years ago the building of a new Cathedral in Los Angeles was completed. It is a magnificent building, if you can imagine a quick sketch of what a Cathedral might look like, bell tower , great entrance, high walls. This is what it looks like on the outside, plane un-adorned but with all the dimensions that would tell you this is a great building, this is a Cathedral. Inside there is a huge space which creates a wonderful sense of the presence of God. But the thing that struck me most is that on the walls of the Church on right and left are these wonderful hangings that represent the saints. They are pictured in groups of five and six, all told there must be hundreds of figures . It is meant I think to remind us that the church that is more than a building, more than bricks and mortar, it is the communion of saints, the saints in heaven, the saints here on earth, journeying forward to the new Jerusalem. On the hangings are all sorts of saints whom we would know, the apostles, the martyrs, even St Margaret, patroness of Scotland, but there is also tucked away in a corner the figure of St Bernadette. She would like that, to be small, insignificant, unknown and unimportant in this great company. She wasn’t an apostle, wasn’t a martyr, she never opened a school, never went to the end of the world as a missionary, never founded a religious order, never read people’s thoughts, never made any remarkable utterance, had no great austerities and yet has become one of the most popular saints since her revelations were made known and since she was canonised on 8th December 1933. She is the great seer of Lourdes but it is her ordinariness that appeals. She is a saint in the midst of ordinary and great things.
Marie Bernarde, known in family circles as Bernadette was born on 7th January 1844 at Lourdes. She was the first of 4 children born to Francis and Louise Soubirous. Her parents knew poverty, they lost the mill that they owned and by 1857 and were quite destitute having to depend on a relative to give them accommodation in an old disused prison, which was far from being a healthy place. Bernadette was a sickly child - at the age of six they were aware that she had asthma and for the next four years she contracted cholera. Most notably she was small and the family noted that after the apparitions she coughed incessantly and her stomach was swollen. In 1857 she was sent into service by her parents in the country, she helped with the care of a young family and in the tending of animals. She was most unhappy at this place called Bartres, she was given no education and little affection, she implored her parents to come for her and eventually returned walking the miles herself on 28th January 1858
It was exactly a fortnight after her return from Bartres on 11th February 1858 that the tremendous thing happened. On a bitter winter day she had gone to collect fire wood at the river and having crossed the river she saw a vision of the mother of God at the grotto, a small rocky place carved out by the river’s course. . Her two companions saw her fall to her knees in prayer. What she saw was not an intellectual vision but with her own human eyes on 18 different occasions apparitions of the Holy Mother of God. Many of the townsfolk saw her fall to her knees and some of the most important people saw it also. She was to be challenged by them and to be held to account for what she said she saw and heard. The names of Jacomet (Police Commissioner), Dutour (The Magistrate) DAngla (Captain of the Gendarme) and of course Peyremale (the parish priest) have passed into history. They each questioned the young girl in detail and were impressed by her clarity and transparency. In the atmosphere of a small village there was suspicion: had people put her up to these, was it her imaginings, was there money to be made. Unknowingly their enquiries became important witnesses for the authenticity of Lourdes. They bullied her, they berated her, the warned her and threatened her but her story remained unchanged, that the Holy Mother of God had a appeared and spoken to her. She had told her name, she had given instructions for her to do and she had sent a message to the PP for what this place must become now and in the future.
After the visions had ended people wanted to venerate her, enquire from her and challenge her. The attention became martyrdom to her for the next eight years she was constantly quizzed. At the age of 21 years in 1865 she entered a convent at Nevers some 30 miles away; she never returned to Lourdes. People implored her to return for the consecration of the basilica in 1876 she never came. She had great difficulties in the convent from superiors who thought they needed to warn her against conceit, although there was no need. She also received much suffering, dying from an illness which brought her much pain before her 36th birthday.
Bernadette had an unstuffy kind of personality and goodness. She would mimic others, her teachers, her doctors, and occasionally her parish priest. She would not let people make more of her than she thought she deserved, she was only a tool, an instrument, a channel, a broom, as she said to be used, and then after use to be put behind the door unseen. She remained for most of her life uneducated. People who knew her saw in her a transparent goodness and kindness. She was happy to do the most menial of work cleaning up, preparing meals, attending to others – she didn’t want to be in the limelight her work was done. Even to this day her body lies many miles away from Lourdes, which her name will be forever associated with.
Her mortal remains may be many miles away but her spirit is still here in Lourdes and her powerful intercession from heaven is still with us. Its here in the pilgrim who comes here like her to kneel at the grotto of Lourdes as she did before this most benevolent vision of the Mother of God. The pilgrim finds poured into their heart astonishing graces. She is present in the helper who like her was interested in no limelight but only to offer their gifts to the sick who come here. She is present in the one who sheds tears here for she shed tears here as many would after her, tears that would be heard in heaven. She is present in the sick and broken, for she herself was known to the mother of God as a sickly child – she is present in the sick who come for healing of body mind and heart. She is present in the heart of the sinner who knows their heart to be far from God, for she saw herself as a sinner also.
Bernadette is here at Lourdes and without her there would be no Lourdes. She is God’s chosen instrument. He chose not the high and mighty of the world but the lowly in the world’s eyes. Just as he had once chosen the lowly humble virgin of Nazareth so he chose this poor child’s in this obscure town to receive this vision and to allow this town to become a place of great grace.
Bernadette, poor child of Lourdes, look kindly from heaven on our pilgrimage. Bernadette look kindly on all who are sick here and as you once knew the burdens of sickness intercede on their behalf. Bernadette, poor child of Lourdes, bless all who have come to help and teach them your way of humble service. Bernadette, poor child of Lourdes, look kindly on all who are pilgrims here and in need of the grace of God. Poor child of Lourdes look kindly on our bishop and priests who need the refreshment that the waters offer. In your kindness Bernadette be with us.
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