Our Lady of Lourdes (; ) is a title of the Virgin Mary. She is venerated under this title by the Roman Catholic Church due to her apparitions that occurred in Lourdes, France. The first apparition of 11 February 1858, of which Bernadette Soubirous (age 14) told her mother that a "Lady" spoke to her in the cave of Massabielle ( from the town) while she was gathering firewood with her sister and a friend. Similar apparitions of the "Lady" were reported on 18 occasions that year, until the climax revelation in which she introduced herself as: "I am the Immaculate Conception". On 18 January 1862, the local Bishop of Tarbes Bertrand-Sévère Laurence endorsed the veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Lourdes.
On 1 February 1876, Pope Pius IX officially granted a decree of canonical coronation to the image as Notre-Dame du Saint Rosaire. The coronation was performed by Cardinal Pier Francesco Meglia at the courtyard of what is now part of the Rosary Basilica on 3 July 1876.
The image of Our Lady of Lourdes has been widely copied and reproduced in shrines and homes, often in garden landscapes. Bernadette Soubirous was canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1933.
Marian devotion has since steadily increased as ecclesiastical investigations sanctioned her visions. In later years, a large church was built at the site that has since become a major site of religious pilgrimage.
Apparitions
On 11 February 1858, Soubirous went with her sister Toinette and neighbor Jeanne Abadie to collect some firewood. While taking off her shoes and stockings to wade through the water near the Grotto of Massabielle, she said she heard the sound of two gusts of wind () but the trees and bushes nearby did not move. A wild rose in a natural niche in the grotto, however, did move.
Soubirous tried to make the sign of the cross but could not, as her hands were trembling. The lady smiled, and invited Soubirous to pray the rosary with her. Soubirous tried to keep this a secret, but Toinette told her mother. After parental cross-examination, she and her sister received corporal punishment for their story.
Three days later, 14 February, Soubirous returned to the grotto. She had brought holy water as a test that the apparition was not of evil origin/provenance: "The second time was the following Sunday … Then I started to throw holy water in her direction, and at the same time I said that if she came from God she was to stay, but if not, she must go. She started to smile, and bowed ... This was the second time."
Soubirous' companions are said to have become afraid when they saw her in ecstasy. She remained ecstatic even as they returned to the village. On 18 February, she spoke of being told by the Lady to return to the Grotto over a period of two weeks. She quoted the apparition: "The Lady only spoke to me the third time … She told me also that she did not promise to make me happy in this world, but in the next."
Soubirous was ordered by her parents to never go there again. She went anyway, and on 24 February, Soubirous related that the apparition asked for prayer and penitence for the conversion of sinners.
The next day, she said the apparition asked her to dig in the ground and drink from the spring she found there. This made her dishevelled and some of her supporters were dismayed, but this act revealed the stream that soon became a focal point for pilgrimages. Although it was muddy at first, the stream became increasingly clean. As word spread, this water was given to medical patients of all kinds, and many reports of miraculous cures followed. Seven of these cures were confirmed as lacking any medical explanations by Professor Verges in 1860. The first person with a "certified miracle" was a woman whose right hand had been deformed as a consequence of an accident. Several miracles turned out to be short-term improvement or even hoaxes, and Catholic Church and government officials became increasingly concerned. The government fenced off the grotto and issued stiff penalties for anybody trying to get near the off-limits area. In the process, Lourdes became a national issue in France, resulting in the intervention of Emperor Napoleon III with an order to reopen the grotto on 4 October 1858. The church had decided to stay away from the controversy altogether.