The growth of Lourdes has been astonishing.  Where does it come from?  There are many Sanctuaries throughout the world.  Doubtless it is because the Message of Lourdes is simple and alive, it is for everyone and linked directly to the Gospel.  It was in a heart to heart meeting that young Bernadette Soubirous received a message without any political or nationalistic reference, without any threats, without any special secrets about the ways of the world and no prophecy for the future.  This message was given during eighteen apparitions between 11 February 1858 and 16 July 1858.

Bernadette saw her first vision of Our Lady on Thursday 11 February 1858.  She was fourteen years old.  She had left her home, the Cachot, with her sister Toinette and a friend of theirs, Jeanne Abadie, to collect wood for the fire.  They made their way down the narrow streets around the Chateau Fort and across the old bridge out of the town into the semi wooded area that lay between the River Gave and the canal that fed the five mills of Lourdes.  They followed the canal to where it joined the River Gave opposite the rock Massabielle.  They could see that there was wood to be gathered here, and the girls began to take off their shoes and stockings to wade over the canal for the wood on the other side.  Bernadette was slower than the other two...

1st Apparition: 11 February 1858
The sign of the Cross

“I’d hardly removed my stockings when I heard a noise like a gust of wind: I turned and looked across the field. I saw that the trees weren’t moving so I continued to take off my shoes and stockings.  Then I heard the same noise again.  As I looked up towards the Grotto I saw a lady in white. She had a white dress, a white veil, a blue cincture and a yellow rose on each foot the same colour as her rosary beads.  I was startled - I thought I was seeing things. I rubbed my eyes and looked again but I could still see the lady. I felt in my pocket and found my rosary. I wanted to make the sign of the Cross but couldn’t lift my hand to my forehead.  The Lady then took the rosary she was holding in her hands and made the sign of the Cross.  Then I tried a second time to make the sign of the Cross and was able to.  Immediately I’d made the sign of the Cross the startled feeling I’d had disappeared.  I knelt down and said my beads with that beautiful lady. The vision fingered her beads but didn’t move her lips. When I had finished saying my rosary, she just disappeared.
 
 
2nd Apparition: 14 February 1858
The smile

“The second time was on the following Sunday, I returned with some young friends to make sure I wasn’t seeing things. When we got to the Grotto I knelt down and began to say the rosary. I’d said the first decade when I saw the same lady. I’d brought a little bottle of Holy Water with me so I shook the Holy Water at her saying if she came from God to stay: if not from God to take herself off!  The more I sprinkled her, the more she smiled…”

3rd Apparition:  18 February 1858
First Words

“She had not spoken to me until the third time.  Arriving, I began to say my rosary and after the first decade I saw the same lady.  I asked her if she had something to say to me and would she be kind enough to let me write it down. She smiled at me and said she had something to say but that it would not be necessary to write it down: would I have the courtesy to come here for the next fourteen days.  I answered yes.  She then told me that she wasn’t promising to make me happy in this world but in the next.