St. Bernadette Soubirous
St. Bernadette Soubirous
Shown many years after her death, her body uncorrupted.
Famed visionary of Lourdes, baptized Mary Bernard. She was born in Lourdes, France, on January 7, 1844, the daughter of Francis and Louise Soubirous. Bernadette, a severe asthma sufferer, lived in abject poverty.
In 1858, four years after the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was proclaimed, Mary appeared to a very poor young girl, Bernadette Soubirous, eighteen times between February 11 and July 16, 1858.
She was placed in considerable jeopardy when she reported the vision, and crowds gathered when she had further visits from the Virgin. The civil authorities tried to frighten Bernadette into recanting her accounts, but she remained faithful to the vision. On February 25, a spring emerged from the cave and the waters were discovered to be of a miraculous nature, capable of healing the sick and lame. On March 25, 1858, on the feast of the Annunciation, Our Lady revealed to the uneducated Bernadette, 'I am the Immaculate Conception' and said that a church should be built on that site.
Because the dogma had been officially proclaimed less than four years earlier, and Bernadette could not even have know of its existence, great credibility was given to Bernadette by her repetition of the Blessed Mother's word. Many authorities tried to shut down the spring and delay the construction of the chapel, but the influence and fame of the visions reached Empress Eugenie of France, wife of Napoleon Ill, and construction went forward.
In 1866, Bernadette was sent to the Sisters of Notre Dame in Nevers. There she became a member of the community, and faced some rather harsh treatment from the mistress of novices. This oppression ended when it was discovered that she suffered from a painful, incurable illness. She died in Nevers on April 16,1879, still giving the same account of her visions.
Lourdes became one of the major pilgrimage destinations in the world, and the spring has produced 27,000 gallons of water each week since emerging during Bernadette's visions.
Bernadette's body was exhumed three times in the early 1900s in the course of research for her beatification. Each time the corpse was reportedly "incorrupt" -- that is, remarkably well preserved. Eventually a thin layer of wax was placed over her features, and her body is now kept in a special shrine in Nevers... The saint's story was told in the 1942 book Song of Bernadette by Franz Werfel; a 1943 movie based on the book was nominated for 12 Academy Awards, and actress Jennifer Jones won the Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Bernadette. As if that wasn't enough of a celebrity status, the singer Madonna named her first child Lourdes.