Eucharistic Procession

(Today on the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ I recall my experience of the daily eucharistic processions in Lourdes by quoting Pope Benedict's experiences there)

"I went to Lourdes, where I was able to join thousands of faithful on the Jubilee Way, which includes the places of St. Bernadette's life: the parish church with the baptismal font where she was baptized; the "cachot" where she lived in great poverty as a girl; the Massabielle Grotto, where the Virgin appeared to her 18 times. In the afternoon I took part in the traditional torchlight procession, which is a wonderful manifestation of faith in God and of devotion to his and our Mother. Lourdes is truly a place of light, prayer, hope and conversion, founded on the rock of the love of God, which had its culminating revelation in the glorious cross of Christ.

By a happy coincidence, last Sunday the liturgy celebrated the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, sign of hope par excellence, because it is the highest testimony of love. In Lourdes, in the school of Mary, first and perfect disciple of Christ, pilgrims learn to regard the crosses of their lives in the light of the glorious cross of Christ. Appearing to Bernadette, in the Grotto of Massabielle, Mary's first gesture was, in fact, the Sign of the Cross, though her hand was trembling.

And so the Virgin gave a first initiation on the essence of Christianity: The Sign of the Cross is the height of our faith, and doing it with an attentive heart we enter into the full mystery of our salvation. The whole message of Lourdes is contained in this gesture of the Virgin! God has so loved us that he gave himself up for us: This is the message of the Cross, "mystery of death and of glory."

The cross reminds us that there is no true love without suffering, there is no gift of life without pain. Many learn this truth in Lourdes, which is a school of faith and hope, because it is also a school of charity and of service to brothers. It is in this context of faith and prayer where the important meeting with the French episcopate took place: It was a moment of intense spiritual communion, in which together we entrusted to the Virgin our common hopes and pastoral concerns.

The next stage was the Eucharistic procession with thousands of faithful, among whom, as usual, were many sick people. Before the most Blessed Sacrament, our spiritual communion with Mary was made even more intense and profound because God gives us eyes and hearts capable of contemplating his Divine Son in the Holy Eucharist. Very moving was the silence of these thousands of people before the Lord, not an empty silence, but one full of prayer and awareness of the Lord's presence, who loved us to the point of being lifted up on the cross for us.

Monday, Sept. 15, liturgical memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows, was dedicated especially to the sick. After a brief visit to the hospital oratory, where Bernadette received her first Communion, I presided over the celebration of Holy Mass in the portico of the Basilica of the rosary, during which I administered the sacrament of anointing of the sick. With the sick and with those taking care of them, I meditated on the tears Mary shed under the cross, and on her smile that illuminates Easter morning.

Dear brothers and sisters, together we thank the Lord for this apostolic journey enriched by so many spiritual gifts. We praise him especially because Mary, by appearing to St. Bernadette, has opened to the world a privileged place to find divine love that heals and saves. In Lourdes, the Holy Virgin invites all to regard earth as a place of pilgrimage toward our final homeland, which is heaven. In reality, we are all pilgrims, we need Mary to guide us; and in Lourdes, her smile invites us to go forward with great confidence in the awareness that God is good, God is love."

She was at Pentecost

Bienvenue! the Anglican National Pilgrimage at Walsing ham, on Bank Holiday Monday, with images of Our Lady of Lourdes and Our Lady of Walsing ham.

The Bishop of Tarbes & Lourdes, Mgr Jacques Perrier (left) with Canon Martin Warner.

Archbishop visits Lourdes

Today is the feast of Our Lady of Walsingham.

Archbishop of Canterbury to preach in Lourdes for 150th anniversary of the visions of the Blessed Virgin Mary

The Archbishop of Canterbury will participate in anniversary celebrations at the Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes, at the invitation of the Bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes, Monsignor Jacques Perrier.

He will preach at the International Mass on 24th September 2008 which is being celebrated by His Eminence Cardinal Walter Kasper, President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity.

The Archbishop will also participate in a Pilgrimage of bishops, clergy and laity of the Church of England, which is organised by the Society of Mary and the Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham.

The Archbishop will be accompanied in Lourdes by the Church of England bishop with particular responsibility for chaplaincies in France, the Right Reverend David Hamid, the suffragan bishop of the Diocese in Europe.

Christian unity is designated as one of the elements of the Church's mission to which the shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes specifically contributes and is one of the strands being celebrated in the 150th anniversary celebrations.

Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, hails Catholic saint at Lourdes

The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams has held up a Roman Catholic saint as an inspiration to the faithful, in a ground breaking visit to the shrine of Lourdes.

Dr Williams said the story of Bernadette Soubirous, the 19th century peasant girl whose visions of Mary led to the founding of the shrine, provided hope for those who were attempting to spread the Christian faith.

He added that the experience of coming to a holy place "soaked in the hopes and prayers of millions" could help people grasp the "deep and mysterious" joy of God.

"Bernardette's neighbours and teachers and parish clergy knew all they thought they needed to know about the Mother of God - and they needed to be surprised by this inarticulate, powerless, marginal teenager who had leapt up in the joy of recognition to meet Mary as her mother, her sister, bearer of her Lord and Redeemer," he said.

"Our prayer here must be that, renewed and surprised in this holy place, we may be given the overshadowing strength of the Spirit to carry Jesus wherever we go, in the hope that joy will leap from heart to heart in all our human encounters.

"And that we may also be given courage to look and listen for that joy in our own depths when the clarity of the good news seems far away and the sky is cloudy."

Dr Williams' remarks were made in a sermon at the International Mass at Lourdes celebrated by Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity.

He is taking part in the first pilgrimage by a Church of England leader to the shrine, a magnet for Roman Catholics, many of them ill or disabled, from all over Europe.

The shrine, in south-west France, is marking the 150th anniversary of the visions.

It was visited earlier this month by Pope Benedict XVI.

Bernadette Anniversary

Today will see large numbers of pilgrims in Lourdes to mark the 150th anniversary of the first appearance of Our Lady to Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes. The celebrations will continue throughout this year's pilgrimage season.

Our Lady announced herself to Bernadette as "I am the Immaculate Conception". She told Bernadette to bring to the attention of the world the necessity of prayer and penance. The response of the faithful has found expression in pilgrimage and the care of the sick and disabled. Lourdes remains a vibrant centre of pilgrimage and devoted faith, the scene of miraculous returns to health or peace of mind and the contented acceptance of God's will. It has been the subject of encyclicals by Popes Pius XII and John XXIII.

"God of mercy, we celebrate the feast of Mary, the sinless Mother of God. May her prayers help us to rise above our human weakness." (Opening Prayer of this Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes)

Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Here is my contribution to this month's parish magazine at St Martin-on-the-hill.

COUNTDOWN TO CHRISTMAS AND THE NEW YEAR

The entry in the Parish Diary for December 8th reads 'The Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary' and refers to the Feast kept on that day.

It is a good place to begin the countdown to Christmas and the New Year.

The doctrine of 'The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary' developed in the West in the Anglo-Saxon England of the early 11th century. It is the belief that Mary, mother of Jesus, being 'full of grace', was 'empty of sin' from her conception.

As recently as 2005 the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) confirmed that our two churches hold this doctrine in common: 'As a result of our study, the Commission offers the following agreements, which we believe significantly advance our consensus regarding Mary. We affirm together....that in view of her vocation to be the Mother of the Holy One, Christ's redeeming work reached back in Mary to the depths of her being and to her earliest beginnings.'

Next year will be a special year in Lourdes. It will be 150 years since Our Lady appeared there 18 times to the young girl, Bernadette Soubirous, between February 11th and July 16th. Her parish priest insisted that she ask the lady for her name. At the sixteenth apparition, on March 25th (Lady Day), Bernadette reported:

'After beseeching her a third time to tell me Her name the Lady's expression turned to sadness and humiliation. She joined Her hands, holding them over Her breast, and raised Her eyes to heaven. Then She slowly unfolded Her hands and, bowing down towards me, said in a trembling voice: I AM THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION.'

The doctrine was infallibly declared only four years before this, in 1854. It seems most unlikely that a semi-literate girl, from an impoverished family, would have been familiar with such a theological expression, still less that she could have made it up.

The Bishop of Whitby is leading a pilgrimage to Lourdes next year from September 22nd to 26th, jointly sponsored by 'The Society of Mary' and 'The Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham'. Further details can be supplied to anyone interested.

May the mystery and joy of Christmas be an inspiration to you through the coming year.

IMMACULATE PROJECTION

In the first week of December, the Jesuit fathers project a giant full-colour image of the Nativity on the Mount Street side of the Church of the Immaculate Conception in London's West End. It is a glorious rebuke to the commercial tawdriness all around. (Today's 'Daily Telegraph')

Mary and Conversion

This is the week of the annual Middlesborough Diocesan Pilgrimage to Lourdes. Two years ago I travelled with them and was much blessed by the experience. My room companion is there now and telephoned before he left to say he would see that I was remembered in prayer at the grotto where our Lady appeared to Bernadette.

Each year there is a pilgrimage theme and this year it is "Be reconciled to God". Here are suggestions how a Lourdes pilgrimage can help this conversion process:

Lourdes - a Special Place for Conversion

In Lourdes, there are many starting points for the road to conversion.
The simplicity of Lourdes: The number of people who come here shows that the question of the ultimate meaning of our lives is not an outdated question. Lourdes is a place where everyone, even those who are outside the Christian faith, are able to look at their lives and find some form of answer.

The person of Bernadette also leads us to see things differently in our ordinary life. Bernadette is a very attractive person through her freedom of spirit and word. But from a human point of view, without any formal education, delicate health, living in destitution with her family, then in the hospice of Lourdes followed by the convent of Nevers, Bernadette was not extraordinary. However, for nearly one hundred and fifty years, thanks to her, the lives of millions of people have been changed.

Mary, the Immaculate Conception: even without properly understanding what is meant by the Immaculate Conception and even if the statues that represent her do not make you very enthusiastic, the Blessed Virgin Mary represents beauty, light and holiness. She is a woman. Jesus has given her to us as a mother. A mother encourages and reaffirms trust. In Lourdes, the Lady smiled frequently when she was with Bernadette. She appeared sad when she spoke of penance: She who is without sin knows better than us that sin is a blockage. With Jesus on the Cross, she also suffered for us.

The sick and those who care for them. Sickness, old-age, and disability imprison us. Very often, they are hidden. Here, in Lourdes, people are amazed to see that they have pride of place. The members of the different hospitalities who look after them appear happy to do so at their own expense by sacrificing part of their holidays. This leads us to question the real value of things and to see how often the voids in their lives are filled by appearances.

The Grotto: People come to pray at the Grotto at all hours. It was the same at the time of the Apparitions; Bernadette was surrounded by people who were praying, while there were others who came to observe as well as the sceptics. But the experience is to go through the Grotto. I am not alone: while some pray before the Grotto, others go before me and others follow me in the slow procession that allows me to enter the Grotto. I see the spring of pure water that reminds me of my baptism, the new life of a child of God. At the back of the Grotto I am in darkness – sin prevents me from seeing clearly. But I come out towards the light, passing by the candle stand – Christ and the saints. I have followed this passage under the watchful eye of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whose statue is in the crevice of the rock and who, according to Bernadette, is not far from us. The passage through the Grotto is a wonderful path of conversion.

The Water Walk and the Baths. Facing the Grotto, nine taps distribute water from the spring. They are not there to fill water bottles but for us to copy the actions the Lady requested of Bernadette: “Go drink of the spring and wash yourself there.” Each tap carries the name of a well from the Bible and gives the reference to that particular place. Some of these names help those who wish to carry out a conversion process. More symbolic again are the actual Baths.

The Ways of the Cross. The title is in the plural because there are several Ways of the Cross in Lourdes: on the Espélugues Hill, on the meadow, in the Underground Basilica of St. Pius X, in St. Joseph’s Chapel, etc, … Whatever their artistic value may be, the Way of the Cross engages us better than any sermon. Who is this innocent man who is put to a humiliating death? In this drama which continues, we are beside Pilate who washes his hands of the affair, the onlookers who laugh and mock the condemned person or with Simon of Cyrene who helps him carry the Cross, Veronica who wipes his face, the centurion who admits that this man is indeed the son of God.

Our Lady of Lourdes

Yesterday was the feast day.

I have been to Lourdes as a pilgrim a number of times both with Jumbulance parties and with Diocesan groups and find it an inspiring and uplifting place in a beautiful location.

Looking for prayer support for my wife who has gone into hospital today for an operation on her throat I automatically include the grotto at Lourdes where Our Lady appeared to Bernadette.

This email will illustrate how it is done:

12 Feb 2007
Internet Form for Lourdes-france.org
From:
intention@lourdes-france.com
Your petition has been sent
Internet Form for Lourdes-france.org

Your prayer petition :
Healing for C at her throat operation today
Skill for the surgeon

We wish to inform you that your petition has been placed at the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes

http://www.lourdes-france.org

Full of Grace

Today we celebrate the Feast of the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Old Irish poem:
Queen of all queens, oh wonder of the loveliness of women, Heart which hath held in check for us the righteous wrath of God; Strong staff of light and fosterer of the Bright Child of heaven, Pray thou for us as we now pray that we may be forgiven.

Some scriptures says the angel greeted Mary with the words “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God” whereas older translations have the more familiar “Hail, Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee.”

“Full of grace” is the scriptural warrant for the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

In the Constitution Ineffabilis Deus of 8 December, 1854, Pius IX pronounced and defined that the Blessed Virgin Mary "in the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin."

The feast is listed in the calendar of the BCP.

ARCIC II agreed: "Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ"
59 Roman Catholics are also bound to believe that “the most blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and in view of the merits of Christ Jesus the Saviour of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin” (Dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, defined by Pope Pius IX, 1854).[11] The definition teaches that Mary, like all other human beings, has need of Christ as her Saviour and Redeemer (cf. Lumen Gentium 53; Catechism of the Catholic Church 491). The negative notion of ‘sinlessness’ runs the risk of obscuring the fullness of Christ’s saving work. It is not so much that Mary lacks something which other human beings ‘have’, namely sin, but that the glorious grace of God filled her life from the beginning.[12] The holiness which is our end in Christ (cf. 1 John 3:2-3) was seen, by unmerited grace, in Mary, who is the prototype of the hope of grace for humankind as a whole. According to the New Testament, being ‘graced’ has the connotation of being freed from sin through Christ’s blood (Ephesians 1:6-7). The Scriptures point to the efficacy of Christ’s atoning sacrifice even for those who preceded him in time (cf. 1 Peter 3:19, John 8:56, 1 Corinthians 10:4). Here again the eschatological perspective illuminates our understanding of Mary’s person and calling. In view of her vocation to be the mother of the Holy One (Luke 1:35), we can affirm together that Christ’s redeeming work reached ‘back’ in Mary to the depths of her being, and to her earliest beginnings. This is not contrary to the teaching of Scripture, and can only be understood in the light of Scripture. Roman Catholics can recognize in this what is affirmed by the dogma - namely “preserved from all stain of original sin” and “from the first moment of her conception.”
60 We have agreed together that the teaching about Mary in the two definitions of 1854 and 1950, understood within the biblical pattern of the economy of grace and hope outlined here, can be said to be consonant with the teaching of the Scriptures and the ancient common traditions. However, in Roman Catholic understanding as expressed in these two definitions, the proclamation of any teaching as dogma implies that the teaching in question is affirmed to be “ revealed by God” and therefore to be believed “firmly and constantly” by all the faithful (i.e. it is de fide). The problem which the dogmas may present for Anglicans can be put in terms of Article VI:
Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.
We agree that nothing can be required to be believed as an article of faith unless it is revealed by God. The question arises for Anglicans, however, as to whether these doctrines concerning Mary are revealed by God in a way which must be held by believers as a matter of faith.

Today would be a good day to be in Lourdes. I love Lourdes and have been on pilgrimage there 5 times. The apparitions experiences there by young Bernadette are well documented. The 13th is the one especially relevant to today.

Thursday, March 25, 1858
Bernadette joyfully rejoined the lady in the grotto. It had been 3 weeks since she saw Aquero and had not known whether she would ever appear again. This time she was determined to obtain the lady's name, so that she could finally tell the priest. Bernadette was characteristically stubborn, and she repeated four times the question she had practiced so often, "Would you be so kind as to tell me who you are?" The answer finally came: "I am the Immaculate Conception."
"I went every day for a fortnight, and each day I asked her who she was–and this petition always made her smile. After the fortnight I asked her three times consecutively. She always smiled. At last I tried for the fourth time. She stopped smiling. With her arms down, she raised her eyes to heaven and then, folding her hands over her breast she said, 'I am the Immaculate Conception.' Then I went back to M. le Curé to tell him that she had said she was the Immaculate Conception, and he asked was I absolutely certain. I said yes, and so as not to forget the words, I had repeated them all the way home."
Bernadette planted a candle between two rocks as a gift, a sign of her prayer and the revelation, and then ran home. Running all the way, she repeated these strange words over and over so that she would not forget them. Of course the words were spoken in her native Bigourdan dialect and were completely unfamiliar, "que soy era Immaculada Councepciou."Fr. Peyramale said that a woman cannot have a name like that. "You are mistaken. Do you know what that means?" The priest was shaken, and unable to talk to Bernadette. He quickly sent her away, and she left without the privilege of understanding the meaning of the title. She was only told later that afternoon that the Blessed Mother carried that title."She could never have invented this ... " wrote Fr. Peyramale to the bishop that evening. The Church declared that Mary was the "Immaculate Conception" only four years earlier in 1854. The title would certainly have been unknown to Bernadette since it was not broadly discussed in the liturgy, and Bernadette still could not read or write. She was only then learning her catechism to prepare for first Holy Communion, a task undertaken typically by children six or seven years her junior. It was her poor health and her family's poverty that had hindered her education.