Given by Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde on the memorial of
Our Lady of Lourdes at the Eighth-Grade Vocations Mass at
Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Annandale.
I am going to talk about two women. Why? Because today, we
celebrate in the Liturgy the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. I
bet that you are thinking that the first woman about whom I
will speak is Our Blessed Mother. Of course, I will - but
later, because, first of all, I want to talk about the other
woman, Saint Bernadette Soubirous, who was about your age
when something amazing happened to her.
On this date in 1858 - over 150 years ago - 14-year-old
Bernadette went to gather wood with her sister and a
neighborhood friend in her village of Lourdes in France. She
got separated from the others, and while she was alone, she
saw an amazing sight: a beautiful woman dressed in dazzling
white with bright yellow roses on her feet. The woman was
holding a rosary, so in silence, Bernadette took out her
rosary and began to pray with this beautiful stranger. When
they finished, the lady disappeared, and Bernadette was
filled with a great sense of peace and a desire to pray with
this lady some more.
When Bernadette told her friends and parents about the
mysterious woman, her mother and father forbade her from
going back to the grotto. In hindsight, we know something
they did not know: The mysterious woman was the Blessed
Mother, so there was nothing to fear. Bernadette was
cautious, but still desired to pray with the woman again. So
a few days later, she went to the same spot, prepared to meet
the woman again. This time Bernadette not only had her
rosary, she also had a bottle of holy water(!), and when the
mysterious woman appeared to pray with her, Bernadette
sprinkled a whole bottle of holy water on her saying, "If you
are from God, stay; if not, go away!" After being doused, the
Blessed Mother simply looked at Bernadette with kindness and
smiled. She did not go away.
Over the next several months, Our Lady appeared to Bernadette
a total of 16 more times in the grotto. In one of her
messages to Bernadette, Our Lady asked that a shrine be built
in her honor at the grotto where she appeared, and, in time,
a beautiful church was built to honor Mary called the
Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes. Today, countless pilgrims
go to visit each year to pray with Our Lady, and dozens of
confirmed miracles have occurred there. Some among us here
have visited this beautiful shrine: I did in September of
2009.
Our Gospel today reminds us that Mary is the source of many
great gifts because she directs us to Jesus. At the wedding
feast at Cana, Mary tells the servants to go to Jesus with
this advice: "Do whatever He tells you to do." Mary teaches
us that the best thing she can do for us is lead us to her
Son, because He is the source of our strength, our healing
and our salvation.
Saint Bernadette - who was canonized a saint in 1933 - also
teaches us about becoming more like Jesus, becoming holy. The
first lesson: Have an active prayer life. When Mary first
appeared in the grotto holding a rosary, Saint Bernadette
quickly took out the rosary she carried with her and began to
pray. We would be wise to imitate Saint Bernadette by
carrying a rosary with us at all times. We would be even
wiser if we took time each day to pray the rosary - even if
only for a decade - that we may come to know and love Mary
more and more and, in turn, come to know and love her Son
through our prayers and Mary's motherly intercession.
The second lesson we can learn from Saint Bernadette: Be
persistent in trying to be faithful to the Lord. Because
nobody could see or hear the Blessed Mother during the
apparitions in Lourdes except Saint Bernadette, many people -
including her parents - did not believe her. Many thought she
was lying to them, and others even thought that Bernadette
had lost her mind.
But the young Bernadette remained faithful to prayer and
faithful to spending time with Our Blessed Mother, even when
it would have been easier to stay away from the grotto. She
wanted to be with Our Lady, no matter what the others
thought. At one point, when she was feeling persecuted by
others, Saint Bernadette asked Our Lady why people were
making this so hard for her. Mary told her, "I do not promise
to make you happy in this world, but in the other." And then
Our Lady asked Bernadette to remain faithful to her prayer,
knowing that would strengthen her and bring her peace.
After the apparitions, Saint Bernadette prayed for help in
discerning a vocation. Because she was so famous due to the
apparitions of Mary, many women religious wanted her to join
their order knowing that if she did, she would bring them a
lot of attention. But Bernadette remained faithful to prayer,
which helped her stay humble in order to discern the plan of
God for her life. Her prayer led her to choose a life with
the Sisters of Charity of Nevers, France, with whom she
became a postulant at the age of 21, a novice at 22, and a
professed sister at the age of 23.
As young people, you, too, are at a time when you are still
discerning what God has planned for each one of you. He does,
in fact, have a plan for your adult life. Like Saint
Bernadette's plan of life, her vocation, the plan of life
which God wills and intends for you, for your own inner
fulfillment and for the good of others, will become clearer
to you as you continue to pray; that is, as you continue to
be open to the Lord, saying honestly to Him: "Speak, Lord,
your servant is listening." You are a person created by God
out of love, with different gifts and talents that He would
like to use to build up His Kingdom and bring many people to
Him.
For some of you that will be marriage, a sacrament revealing
in the love of husband and wife the love of Christ for His
Bride, the Church. For others, that will be the consecrated
life as a religious priest, deacon, brother or sister. Some
young men here today are being called to the priesthood.
Whatever your specific vocation is, know that when we follow
Saint Bernadette's model of eagerness in prayer and
persistence in being faithful, we more readily follow
whatever path God has chosen for us in this life.
Let us pray to Our Lady, that she may bring us closer to her
Son Jesus, and the specific path He has laid out for each one
of us in our adult life. I know the path God has pointed for
me: to be the Bishop of Arlington with so many collaborators
in building up this portion of Christ's Mystical Body!
Our Lady of Lourdes, pray for us.
Saint Bernadette, pray for us.