If you have ever bought a home, the biggest thing you need to remember is location, location, location. I have been told that when it comes to making movies, the most thing is script, script, script. So in this same theme, today we focus on one of the most important Marian Apparitions in the history of the Church – Lourdes, Lourdes, Lourdes. I say one because I would also say that we should include – Fatima, Fatima, Fatima.

The Apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes to Saint Bernadette is largely important in the history of the Church, most especially in the years that followed the apparitions. One of the most important things we witness is the Immaculate Conception. When Bernadette asks her name, the Lady says – I am the Immaculate Conception. This is important because it was only a few years before that the Church declared the Immaculate Conception dogmatic.

Pope St. John Paul in Lourdes, 2004

Our Lady of Lourdes also plays important role in the understanding of human life and the dignity of life. We see this most evidently in the homily by Pope St. John Paul II when he visited Lourdes for the third time in his papacy. Not only does he make a plea for human life, he also speaks about the importance of women and how important their role is when it comes to being a mother. He concludes to say that the Lourdes message is not only for women, but for all people of all time. If there was a time when this message needs to be heard, it would be today –

“From this grotto I issue a special call to women. Appearing here, Mary entrusted her message to a young girl, as if to emphasize the special mission of women in our own time, tempted as it is by materialism and secularism: to be in today’s society a witness of those essential values which are seen only with the eyes of the heart. To you, women, falls the task of being sentinels of the Invisible! I appeal urgently to all of you, dear brother and sisters, to do everything in your power to ensure that life, each and every life, will be respected from conception to its natural end. Life is a sacred gift, and no one can presume to be its master.

Finally, Our Lady of Lourdes has a message for everyone. Be men and women of freedom! But remember: human freedom is a freedom wounded by sin. It is a freedom which itself needs to be set free. Christ is its liberator; he is the one who “for freedom has set us free” (cf. Gal 5:1). Defend that freedom!” 

It is my hope that you will either share this post on your social media pages or copy and paste this quote from John Paul II’s homily and share that on your social media pages. It needs to be read by many and the intercession of Our Lady of Lourdes should be asked for immediately.

Below are more blog posts I have written over the years on Our Lady of Lourdes. I hope you will read these posts to give yourself a better understanding of Our Lady of Lourdes and the importance this apparition plays in the Catholic Church today –

1. “Mondays with Mary” – Our Lady of Lourdes  

2. “Mondays with Mary” – Pope Benedict XVI on the Memorial of Our Lady of Lourdes 

3. “Mondays with Mary” – Saint Bernadette and Our Lady of Lourdes  

4. Our Lady of Lourdes 

5. “Mondays with Mary” – The Prayer to Our Lady of Lourdes by Pope St. John Paul II 

6. “Mondays with Mary” – Prayers to Our Lady of Guadalupe, Lourdes, and Fatima

Our Lady of Lourdes…Pray for Us 

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