Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Our Lady of Lourdes



Feb 11, 1858, Our Lady appeared to Bernadette.  In a series of apparitions she continued to insist that the people convert and believe in the gospel, to pray and do penance. 

On March 25, 1858, she spoke to Bernadette under the title of "Immaculate conception."

The pope reminds us that Mary, as the immaculate conception, reveals to the church her true vocation that is "to receive Christ and to offer him to the world."

Only then can we have a true transformation from the inside out. 

John Paul II on his visit to the grotto in 2004 reminded us, "we must desire to learn from the lowly handmaid of the Lord an attitude of docility and openness to the word of God and a generous commitment to welcoming Christ's teaching into out lives."

Then he implored the Blessed Mother to "be our guide along the paths of the world and teach us to experience and to spread the love of Christ, to stand with you before the innumerable crosses on which your Son is still crucified... and thus build up the world beginning from within: in the depths of silence and prayer, in the joy of fraternal love, in the unique fruitfulness of the Cross."

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