Lourdes has become a special place for HCPT since Michael Strode first brought those few children in 1956; but it is also a special shrine for millions upon millions of Catholics around the world, and has been so for more than a century-and-a-half. This is the story of how a small village in the foothills of the Pyrenees became such an important and special place.
The Child Who Saw and Listened - The Story of St. Bernadette
On 9th January 1843, François Soubirous, a miller, married Louise Castérot. He was 35 years old, she was only nineteen. François went to live with his wife’s family to work the Boly Mill in Lourdes.
Bernadette, their first child, was born on 7th January 1844. She was baptized two days later in the Parish Church at Lourdes. She was given the name “Marie Bernarde” but soon everyone called her Bernadette. She had six brothers and two sisters. Four of the boys and one of the girls died before they were ten years old.
In November 1844 Bernadette’s mother had an accident and could not breast feed her any longer. At this time it was usual to breast feed a baby for at least two years. So Bernadette went to live with her foster mother, Marie Aravant Laguës in Bartres which is about three miles outside Lourdes. She stayed there for eighteen months.
By 1854 Bernadette’s father was unable to pay the rent for the mill. He was a very kind man who became very poor because he had given away too much food and drink to poor people and was short of money. The man who owned the mill took it over and the Soubirous family had to leave. In 1855 when Bernadette was eleven, she caught cholera and was very ill indeed. This illness and her asthma made her very weak for the rest of her life.
Her father did not find another mill to work so the family were very poor. By 1857 they had to go and live in one small room. At one time this room had been a prison called the Cachot.
Bernadette was still not very well so she was sent back to her foster mother at Bartres. While she lived there, she had the job of looking after the sheep. Bernadette so much wanted to join the catechism class to prepare for her First Holy Communion that she asked to go back home to Lourdes.
In January 1858 Bernadette returned home and joined the catechism class to prepare for her First Communion. Although she was fourteen she was put in a class of children who were seven or eight years old. Bernadette had never been able to go to school before and she could not read or write.
On 11th February 1858 the Soubirous family needed firewood. Bernadette, her sister, and a friend went down to a cave area, near a stream, called Massabielle to collect wood. Two of the girls crossed the stream but Bernadette didn’t want to paddle across in case she caught a cold which would make her ill again. While the others looked for wood Bernadette started to say her rosary. It was here at the Grotto that Our Lady appeared eighteen times to Bernadette. She was the only one who saw The Lady.
On the third visit Our Lady asked Bernadette to go to Massabielle fifteen more times. She promised that she would. Our Lady told Bernadette that she wanted a church to be built there. She also told Bernadette to drink at the spring, but Bernadette could not see a spring. Our Lady pointed to the ground and Bernadette scraped away at the soil and soon was able to drink the water that came out of the ground.
“I am the Immaculate Conception”.
During the time that Our Lady appeared to Bernadette she gave this message to pass on to the people:
“I want people to come in procession, to pray for sinners, to do penance, and to drink and wash in the waters of the spring.”
Bernadette did all she had been asked to by Our Lady.
On 3rd June in the same year, at the age of fourteen Bernadette made her First Communion, at the Hospital Chapel in Lourdes, with the rest of her class.
In September, Fr. Peyramale, their parish priest helped the Soubrious family to move out of the Cachot. Bernadette was Confirmed in Lourdes by Bishop Laurence of Tarbes, on 5th February 1860. On 15th June in the dsame year Bernadette went to live with the nuns in Lourdes. She was sixteen years old. She lived with them for the next six years. The nuns looked after her while she helped with the sick in the hospital. For the first time in her life she was able to go to school.
Bernadette was a very small person - only four foot seven inches (140cms) tall. She looked more like an eleven year-old child than a sixteen year-old woman. She found some lessons very difficult but she was very good at sewing. People may have expected her to be a very serious person and would have been surprised to find that she was full of fun, she liked to play jokes and enjoyed joining in the children’s games. At other times she liked to be quiet and to pray.
18th January 1862 was an important day for Bernadette. For it was on this day that the Bishop of Tarbes agreed that what she had seen and heard at the Grotto was really true. He also said that a church was to be built near the Grotto jut as Our Lady had asked.
Later that same year on 28th April, Bernadette once again became very ill and almost died.
On 3rd July 1866 Bernadette left Lourdes for the convent at Nevers. She was now twenty-two years old. When she became a nun she was given the name of Sister Marie Bernard. At Nevers, life was not always easy. In the convent some of the nuns were jealous of the fuss made of her, but she was never unkind to them.
On 30th October 1867 Bernadette became a nun by making her Simple Vows. The Bishop gave her the job of praying.
From 1867 to 1873 Bernadette looked after the nuns who were sick at the convent. She was often ill herself but this only made her a really good nurse. SHe could cheer up the sick with her sense of fun and good humour.
Just after Easter Sunday in 1879 Bernadette became very ill once again. She was in great pain and was very weak. On Wednesday 16th April 1979, having joined in with the prayers of the other nuns around her bed, she died in peace, at the age of thirty-five.
On the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, 8th December 1933, Bernadette was made a saint of the Church.
The above text has been taken from the Lourdes Prayer Book, and is © 1996 HCPT and Hosanna House Trust.