Bernadette Soubirous

St. Bernadette Soubirous is shown circa 1861.

Bernadette Soubirous was born in 1844, the first child of an extremely poor miller in the town of Lourdes in southern France. The family was living in the basement of a dilapidated building when on Feb. 11, 1858, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to Bernadette and told her, “I am the Immaculate Conception.”

There were 18 appearances in all, the final one occurring on the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, July 16. Although Bernadette’s initial reports provoked skepticism, her daily visions of “the Lady” brought great crowds of the curious. The Lady, Bernadette explained, had instructed her to have a chapel built on the spot of the visions. There, the people were to come to wash in and drink the water of the spring that had welled up from the very spot where Bernadette had been instructed to dig.

Jean Lee holds an M.A. and a Doctorate of Ministry.

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