Lourdes: Mary’s Warning for This Advent

Mary’s warning at Lourdes wasn’t only for 1858 — it’s for us right now, in a world distracted, divided, and starving for grace.

This Advent, we return to the grotto to hear what Heaven asked… and why the message still matters.

Transcript

A girl hears a sudden blast of wind, but nothing around her is moving. She looks up and sees a lady standing inside a rocky grotto. People said she was imagining it. Some said she was sick. Others came just to watch her fail. But then the spring appeared. The healings began and investigators could not explain any of it. This is the story of Lords. The apparitions that no one believed until they couldn't ignore them anymore. Welcome to episode two of our Advent series exploring Mary and apparitions in preparation for Christmas. To understand what happened, we have to go back to a cold February morning in 1858 to a girl who wasn't looking for a miracle. Her name was Bernadette Soubirous sickly, asthmatic, barely educated, so poor her family lived in an abandoned prison cell. Not exactly the kind of person you would expect for someone to be the center of a supernatural event that would change the world. Bernadette was gathering firewood with her sister and a friend. Nothing supernatural, just chores. Then she heard it, a sudden gust of wind, but the trees around her were perfectly still. She turned towards the grotto of Masabiel, and that's when she saw her, a lady dressed in white, wearing a white veil, a blue sash, and a yellow rose on each foot. Bernadette made the sign of the cross and prayed the rosary with the lady. When the prayer ended, the lady vanished. Bernadette returned to the grotto, but now she wasn't alone. Crowds followed her, some hoping, some doubting, some mocking. Officials tried to stop her, and doctors tried to diagnose her. Journalists mocked her. Even her parents were embarrassed. But Bernadette stayed calm, consistent, and sincere. She never added details. She never changed her story, and she never sought attention. And during the eighth apparition, the lady finally spoke, "Penance, penance, penance. Pray to God for sinners. Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners." Bernadette obeyed immediately. People stared, confused, uncomfortable. Then came the ninth apparition. 300 people were there, and our lady said to Bernadette, "Go drink from the spring." But there was no spring, only mud. Bernadette dug with her hands until a little water appeared. She drank it, ate bitter herbs, and whispered, "It is for sinners." Crowds didn't know what to think. Within days, that muddy trickle became a flowing spring. As word spread, people began reporting healings, cases even doctors couldn't explain. On March 1st, a lady by the name of Katherine Latipi traveled 7 km through the night to reach the spring. Her arm had been dislocated for years. She plunged it into the water and instantly regained movement. This was the first miracle of Lawrence. By the late 1850s, France was aggressively secular. Local authorities tried everything to shut the apparitions down, but crowds kept coming and healings kept happening. So, the church launched a multi-year investigation. Doctors studied cures. Witnesses gave testimony. Bernadette was questioned over and over. And remember, she was uneducated, unable to fabricate complex theology or mystical vocabulary. Yet, her description never changed. During one apparition, the lady finally revealed her identity. I am the Immaculate Conception. Bernadette had never heard the phrase. She repeated it over and over, terrified she'd forget the words before delivering them to the priest. But for investigators, this was the moment that changed everything. The dogma of the immaculate conception had been defined only 4 years earlier. There was no way a poor uneducated girl could have invented it. 3 and 1/2 years after the final apparition. The church reached its conclusion. The apparitions were authentic. Inside the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Lurs, a marble engraving still displays Bishop Lawrence's declaration. We judge that the immaculate Mary, mother of God, really appeared to Bernadette Soubirous on the 11th of February 1858 and on the following days 18 times in the grotto of Masabiel near the city of Lords. Okay, so let's chat about this for a second. Mary appeared to St. Bernadette 18 times. And there's two things I want to touch on today. First, her message about penance. During the eighth apparition, Mary said, "Penance, penance, penance. Pray to God for sinners. Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners." This kind of strikes me as a little od. You know, you wouldn't expect our lady to ask a young girl of 14 years old to kiss the ground as a sign of penance or reparation for sin. But this is exactly what her request was and this is exactly what St. Bernadette did in front of other people. She she doesn't worry about, oh, what are people going to think about me? She responds to the lady. She kisses the ground. She crawls on the ground. She does unusual things. For what purpose? Well, our lady said it was for penance, for the conversion of sinners. And then we have the next day our lady telling St. Bernadette to go and drink from the spring. Now, the problem here is that there is no spring. So, Bernadette's walking back and forth and she sees some mud and she stops there. She bends down and starts scraping it up. And then she takes some mud and puts it in her mouth. She spits it out. She takes some more mud and puts it in her mouth again. She spits it out. And a third time she puts mud in her mouth, spits it out again. Kind of unusual. By this time, there's a little hole and she scoops up a little bit of water that is gathered there. Then she gets back up to her feet and turns towards the crowds and her her face is mud stained and her aunt comes quickly to clean her up. Now our lady didn't say, "Oh, Bernadette, you're going too far with your penances. Oh, by the way, she also ate grass." Okay, so she ate grass. She ate mud. She spits it out. Like our lady didn't say, "Bernadette, you've gone too far." And this is the point I think sometimes we some people think well penances are excessive in the church. We we don't need to do that anymore. Well, a lady didn't go down that road. She asked St. Bernadette to make penance to do these acts in reparation for sin. So my question to you is in this advent, what kind of grass are you going to eat? And I'm not meaning meaning that you have to go out and eat grass. meaning what are the penances that you're going to adopt during this advent season because Advent like Lent is also a penitential time where we offer our penances for our own sin and reparation for those others people in preparation to meet Jesus. I I think we've got away from this in our church and we live in a culture that is addicted to comfort. Mhm. And when we idolize comfort, we will never find Christ. Now to the second point, our lady reveals her identity to St. Bernadette saying, "I am the immaculate conception." Now, what can we learn from this? St. Alphonsus says, "From the first moment of her life, Mary received grace greater than that of all the saints united." And for what purpose? St. And Alphonsus continues, "She came into the world full of grace, not only for her own glory, but for our good." Mary's mission did not begin at the enunciation with the angel Gabriel. It began at the immaculate conception where she was conceived without the stain of original sin and destined to be the mother of God. Now consider this. Even before Mary took a step, talked baby talk to St. man crawled on that ground before before she was born. She was filled with the fullness of grace. More grace than all the other saints combined for what purpose? To give us grace to give us Jesus. See, Mary's immaculate conception is just not a private thing. Her purity is not a private thing. Her holiness is not a private thing. Mary was immaculate conceived not to be in competition with the redemptive work of Jesus Christ but to bring the redemptive work of Jesus Christ to us. Mary conceived without sin, our Lady of Lords, pray for us.