VATICAN CITY -- A French girl who saw a vision of the Virgin Mary in a cave at Lourdes 75 years ago was proclaimed a saint today and henceforth will be revered among the immortals of the Roman Catholic church.
Beside the hordes of Italians who watched Pope Pius and his colorful escort go to St. Peter's for the canonization ceremony, 6,000 French Pilgrims were here to pay honor to the girl Bernadette Soubirous, who died a nun in 1879.
There was a moving contrast between the pageantry of today's ceremony and the picture of little Bernadette as she sat, her rough woolen stockings in her hand as she prepared to wade an icy stream and saw the Virgin in a grotto.
It is the grotto in whose entrance Bernadette saw the vision that has become world-famous as the Lourdes Shrine, to which millions of Catholics have gone to seek intercession for their ailments, and have returned proclaiming cures. Bernadette herself died in a convent after 20 years of pain, saying that perhaps it was intended she was to suffer that others might be saved from suffering.
Went to gather firewood
Bernadette was a peasant girl. Her father was ill. There was no food in the house. On Feb. 1, 1858, Bernadette, her younger sister Toinette and a neighbor child, Jeanne Abadie, went to gather firewood.
They came to an icy stream. Bernadette had asthma and asked Jeanne to carry her across. Jeanne refused. Bernadette sat down and took off her stockings. She heard a thunderous noise. The others were oblivious. She heard it again and turning her head toward the grotto saw the Virgin at its entrance in a gold cloud young, beautiful, with golden hair and blue eyes, a veil about her head, her feet bare, save for a golden rose on each, a belt of blue around her robe, a chaplet with a chain and cross of gold over her right arm.
Frightened and awed, Bernadette scrambled to her knees. The other girls also were frightened, because they saw nothing and feared for Bernadette's sanity.
But 18 times up to Oct. 1 the girl saw the vision in the grotto.
"Come here for 15 days,"the vision said on its third appearance.
"I promise then to make you happy, not in this world but in the next."
Frequently the vision spoke, often to order prayer, and on the 17th visit to say:
"I am the immaculate conception."
Lourdes tradition grows
The story of the visions got about the town, to Bernadette's family, to friends and neighbors and to the parish priest. They were soon convinced that Bernadette had seen the vision and the Lourdes tradition began to grow. Bernadette went into a convent to become Sister Marie-Bernard. She died in 1879, at 35.
Today the pageantry of the Roman church, preserved and augmented through the centuries, was brought to its most colorful to do her honor.
Pope Pius was borne high above the crowd in his chair at the head of the procession to St. Peter's. In his entourage were cardinals, bishops, priests and humbler servants of the church; the surpliced choir of the cathedral, the Swiss and noble guards of the Papal Gendarmes in their gorgeous uniforms
