MIRACLE OF LOURDES, 1858 The nineteenth-century revolt against

God was led by some of the most brilliant men. God had given them their wonderful minds that they might better serve Him. He permitted them to make astounding discover-ies in the field of science and great progress in a material way. Instead of thanking Him, they took all the credit to themselves.

The ordinary people decided these great men knew what they were talking about. The peasants of La Salette cursed and swore and defiled the Sabbath because the men they respected said there was no longer a need for God. The anti-God movement was growing. There is no telling where it might have ended if it had been allowed to go unchecked. But Our Lady had no intention of letting it go un-checked. Her appearances in Paris and at La Salette and the definition of her Immaculate Conception had started a countermovement in the world. In 1858, the movement was spurred on by the most challenging series of apparitions that had taken place up to that time.

Since the revolt against God was led by such brilliant men, we might expect Mary to combat it by raising up a saint of great intel-lectual powers - a saint who would lead peo-ple back to God by the very brilliance of his arguments. Instead, Mary chose Bernadette Soubirous, a poor, sickly, uneducated peasant girl, who at the age of fourteen did not even know her catechism.

Bernadette had gone with her sister and a friend to gather firewood. The other two girls had run on, leaving her to follow as best she could. Suddenly as she stooped over to take off her shoes before crossing a little mill-stream, there was a noise like a violent wind. Startled, Bernadette looked up and saw a golden cloud emerge from a grotto on the other side of the stream. This was followed by a beautiful Lady.

Said Bernadette later, "She smiled at me and motioned me to advance, as if she had been my mother. All fear left me; I seemed to know no longer where I was. I rubbed my eyes; I shut them; I opened them. But the Lady was still there, continuing to smile at me and mak-ing me understand that I was not mistaken. Without thinking of what I was doing, I took my rosary in my hands and went to my knees. The Lady made a sign of approval with her head and took into her hands her own rosary which hung on her right arm." As Bernadette

recited the Rosary, the Lady allowed her own beads to glide through her fingers. When the Rosary was finished, the Lady returned to the interior of the rock, and the cloud went with her.

This happened near the town of Lourdes in the southwestern corner of France on Feb-ruary 11, 1858. It was the first of nineteen appearances which our Lady was to make to Bernadette Soubirous. The people of Lourdes had never wavered in their faith from the time they were first converted. They had endured the persecutions of the Roman emperors, the Vandals, the Arians, and the Albigensians. When many other people in southern France succumbed to the Protestant Revolt, they held fast. They did not fall prey to the madness that swept most of France at the time of the French Revolution. Nor did they join the revolt against God which was led by the nineteenth-century intellectuals and liberals. They were especially devoted to the Blessed Virgin.

Perhaps it was because of all this that Mary chose Lourdes as the scene of her appa-ritions in 1858. As news of the apparitions spread , larger and larger crowds were attracted to the grotto. Only Bernadette saw the Lady. The others saw nothing but a big black hole in the rocks. But the people saw Bernadette in her ecstasy and knew when our Lady was there. Most of the people believed Bernadette's story. A minority, including the government officials and other members of the "intelligentsia", scoffed at it. This minority was to cause trouble.

During the third apparition, Thursday, February 18, Mary said to Bernadette: "I do not promise to make you happy in this world but in the next." Bernadette was to have many occasions to recall these words before she died.

During the eighth apparition, the crowd saw the girl move on her knees to the rose-bush upon which the Lady had been standing. She prostrated herself at each step. Then turn-ing to the people, she cried, "Penitence! Peni-tence!"

Our Lady revealed a spring of water dur-ing the ninth apparition. This water was to become world famous for the miraculous cures worked through it. On Friday, February 26, the Lady said, "Bend low and kiss the ground for the sake of sinners." Bernadette did, and so did most of the spectators.

On March 7, the Lady requested that a chapel be built at the place of her appearance. She also said that she wished processions to

FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

February 5, 2017

5th SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

Volume 5 Issue 6

Our Lady of the Rosary

15 Pepper Street Monroe CT 06468

(203) 261-8290 Emergencies: (203) 268-9200

www.rosarychapel.net

Fr. Adan Rodriguez (Pastor) frrodriguez@rosarychapel.net

HOLY MASS

Sundays: 7:00 & 10:00 am Weekdays: 8:00 am

CONFESSIONS

Sundays 6:40—6:55 am 9:15—9:55 am

Weekdays 7:40—7:55 am

and by appointment

HOLY ROSARY

Sundays: After 7:00 am Mass

and at 9:40 am

First Saturdays: after 7:00 am

Mass

We will have an

Advisory Board

meeting next Sunday

February 12, after

10:00 o’clock Mass.

O u r L a d y o f t h e R o s a r y C h a p e l

OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY CHAPEL

MASS

INTENTIONS:

I have Mass intentions until March 9, 2017.

Although visited by many pil-

grims each year, until World

War II Lourdes was virtually

unknown in many parts of the

world. Then an amazing thing

happened. Franz Werfel, an

Austrian Jew, found himself in

Lourdes in 1940. The French

army had collapsed, and Wer-

fel knew he was a marked man

with the Nazis. He and his wife

fled toward the border of

Spain, but they found the bor-

der closed. Forced to reside in

Lourdes, in hourly danger of

being apprehended, Werfel

listened with wonder to the

story of Bernadette and the

apparitions. "One day in my

great distress," said Werfel, a

professional writer, "I made

vow. I vowed that if I escaped

from this desperate situation

and reached the saving shore

of America, I would put off all

other tasks and sing, as best I

could, the song of Bernadette."

When he made this promise, it

seemed impossible that he

should escape the Nazi net

that was closing in on him. Yet,

escape he did. He made good

his promise and wrote the

novel, The Song of Bernadette.

Amazingly, the book became a

best seller overnight. Even

more amazing, a movie was

made from the book, and mil-

lions of people in America and

in other parts of the world sat

in darkened theaters and

watched the wondrous story of

Bernadette.

The Woman Shall Conquer-

Don Sharkey

come there. March 25 was the feast of the Annuncia-

tion. On this day Bernadette had an uncontrol-lable desire to ask her visitor her name. Others had freely been calling her the Blessed Virgin, but to Bernadette she had been "the Lady". The girl made her request, and the Lady mere-ly smiled. Bernadette repeated the question, and then she asked it a third time. "The Lady was standing above the rosebush," Bernadette tells us, "in a position very similar to that shown on the Miraculous Medal. At my third request, her face became very serious, and she seemed to bow down in an attitude of humility. Then she joined her hands and raised them to her breast. She looked up to heaven. Then slowly opening her hands and leaning toward me, she said to me in a voice vibrating with emotion: 'I am the Immaculate Conception.' "

These momentous words meant nothing to the ignorant peasant girl. She repeated them to her pastor, Abbe Peyramale. This priest had been very skeptical about the appa-ritions, but now his skepticism began to fade. Bernadette could not have made up those words!

Thus Our Lady put heaven's approval on Pope Pius IX's infallible Definition of the Im-maculate Conception of just a little more than three years before. The whole story of the Fall of man, the Incarnation, and the Redemption are implicit in her words: "I am the Immacu-late Conception."

The local politicians saw that the crowds were getting larger, and crowds made them nervous. Mobs in Paris had overthrown the government in 1789, in 1830, and in 1848. Who could tell what a crowd in Lourdes might do in 1858? Most of these local politicians called themselves Catholics. They attended Mass every Sunday and made their Easter du-ty. But they scoffed at the idea that the Blessed Virgin might really be appearing. Such things just did not happen in the enlightened nineteenth century.

The officials questioned Bernadette and threatened her but they could get nowhere. They even threatened her father who had once been in jail on an unproved charge of theft. This did no good either. When all else failed, they put a fence around the grotto. Then they placed police on guard to see that no one broke the fence. The fence did not pre-vent the Blessed Mother from appearing once more. Bernadette had to kneel on the other side of the river, but that made no difference. "I saw neither the river nor the barrier. The distance between the Lady and me appeared no greater than usual. I saw nothing but the Blessed Virgin, and never had I seen her so beautiful." Mary smiled a tender farewell.

After that, Bernadette saw her no more. But that did not end the story of Lourdes. That was just the beginning. So devoted were the people to Our Lady of Lourdes that they kept contriving to get past the fence. Many of them

would be caught and fined, but then they would go back again. Finally, they appealed to Louis Napoleon, who by this time had made himself Emperor Napoleon III. He ordered the grotto opened. The happy pilgrims flocked there in large numbers.

A commission appointed by the Bishop of Tarbes, the diocese in which Lourdes was lo-cated, investigated Bernadette's story thor-oughly. Every witness was questioned again and again. Bernadette told her story over and over. On January 18, 1862, the Bishop gave his approval. The growth of the shrine was rapid after that. Three great churches were built, one above the other, and a hospital for sick pilgrims. Today it is one of the most famous shrines in the world. A million and a half pil-grims go there every year. The devotion of these pilgrims is inspiring. So many people are praying at the same time and with such inten-sity that the air seems to be charged with prayer.

Bernadette later entered the convent. As Our Lady had warned her, she found no happi-ness in this world. She suffered from the curi-osity of visitors who wished to see "the saint", from the strictness of her superior who was of the mistaken opinion that Bernadette needed humbling, and from the tuberculosis that racked her body. Hundreds of pilgrims were being cured at Lourdes, but for Bernadette there was no cure. She died on the afternoon of April 16, 1879. On her lips was a final prayer to her Lady of the grotto: "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for me, a poor sinner, a poor sin-ner. . . ." She was canonized on December 8, 1933.

Louis Bourriette, a blind stonecutter of Lourdes, was the first to discover the miracu-lous properties of the spring which our Lady had disclosed. From that time to today thou-sands of persons have been cured of their afflictions by means of this water. Bathhouses have been erected so that pilgrims can bathe in it. At first most of the cures took place in the baths. Since 1905, when Pope Pius X advocat-ed the practice of frequent Communion, more cures have taken place during the procession of the Blessed Sacrament than in the baths. Our Lady seems to be giving her approval to the action of the saintly Pontiff.

In 1882, the Medical Bureau was estab-lished to investigate the cures. The Medical Bureau is open to all doctors. These doctors are invited to examine any pilgrims who claim to have been cured, and they are free to go through the files. The visiting doctors are of all nationalities and all religious persuasions. The pilgrim who claims to have been cured must have a certificate from his local physician say-ing that he suffers from an incurable malady. This is all important. If he does not have this, or if it is too vague, he is not examined at all. If his certificate is satisfactory, the pilgrim under-goes a most intense examination. The Bureau can make four possible decisions regarding his

M A S S S C H E D U L E

MASS TIMES AT ST. MARY THE VIRGIN

1520 Delaware St, Paulsboro, New Jersey 08066

*Mass may be cancelled in the event of inclement weather.

Call Mrs. Mary Bocchino for any information: 856 228 4450 or Mrs. Windfeld 856 4564232 www.stmarychapel.org

SUNDAY February 5

5th SUNDAY AFTER EPHIPHANY

St. Agatha, VM

G

7:00 am 10:00 am

Superior’s intentions

Missa pro Populo

MONDAY February 6

St. Titus, BC

St. Dorothy, VM

W

8:00 am 7:00 pm

David Bouton

Requiem Mass, Rosary and St. Joseph’s Litany for the Poor Souls.

TUESDAY February 7

St. Romuald, Ab

W

8:00 am

Robert di Cecco, R.I.P.

WEDNESDAY February 8

St. John of Matha, C

W

8:00 am

Bew, Jim, Gabriel & Jessica Kriskowski

THURSDAY February 9

St. Cyril of Alexandria, BCD

St. Apollonia, VM

W

8:00 am

Christy, Scott, Donavan, Declan

& Dylan Kriskowski

FRIDAY February 10

St. Scholastica, V

W

8:00 am

Ronald & Michelina Seppi

SATURDAY February 11

APPARITION OF OUR LADY OF

LOURDES

W

7:00 am

Veronica Soucy

SUNDAY February 12

SEPTUAGESIMA SUNDAY

V

7:00 am 10:00 am

Superior’s intentions

Missa pro Populo

Devotions: Requiem Mass—Monday evening at 7:00 P.M. followed by the

Holy Rosary and St. Joseph’s Litany for the Poor Souls in Purgatory.

February 5 5:00 pm. Fr. Rodriguez

February 12 9:30 am. Fr. Bachtiger

February 19 5:00 pm. Fr. Rodriguez

February 26 9:30 am. Fr. Bachtiger

For those wishing to have Masses said, an expected stipend of at least $20.00 must be paid at the time of the request. (more may be offered) If this is to be paid by check, make the check payable to Fr. Rodriguez .

case: (1) no cure has taken place; (2) there has been only a partial cure; (3) the cure is complete, but some natural explanation might be given; (4) the cure is complete, and no natural explanation can be given.

It is only the last class in which the Bu-reau is further interested. The cure is not certified, however, unless the pilgrim comes back a year later for another examination. The Bureau wishes to be sure that there has been no relapse. The word miracle is never used by the Medical Bureau. It merely certi-fies that a case considered incurable has been cured. The Church's position on mira-cles is simple: Miracles are perfectly possi-ble. God made the natural laws, and He can set them aside. It is seldom, however, that the Church says, "This is a miracle". The cures that have taken place at Lourdes are not certified as miracles although people all over the world are accustomed to refer to them as such.

Madame Biré, in 1908, had her sight restored although her optic nerves were atrophied. Occulists testified that according to all laws of science she was blind. Yet she could read the smallest type in the newspa-pers. Father McSorley in his book, Outline of Church History, says that, in the fifty years following 1858, some 4,000 medically mi-raculous cures were recorded at Lourdes. They are still taking place.

Particularly fascinating is the perpetual miracle of Lourdes. At the hospital, the pa-tients are segregated according to sex but

not according to disease. Persons with many different kinds of sickness are packed to-gether in one room as close as the beds will fit. At the baths, the water is changed only twice a day. Patients with running sores, with cancerous growths, and with every kind of infectious disease are plunged in one after another. Yet, neither in the hospitals nor in the baths has there ever been a case of a patient becoming worse or contracting a new disease. At the beginning of the twentieth century a group of doctors tried to close Lourdes on the grounds that it was unsanitary. Their attempt failed because they could not find a single case of infection resulting from a visit to the shrine.

What do men of "science" have to say about all this? Most of them simply refuse to recognize Lourdes. "Miracles are impossi-ble", they say. And that is that.

The late Dr. Alexis Carrel was asked to leave the University of Lyons because he said that one of his patients had been cured at Lourdes. When Dr. Carrel's book, Man the Unknown, appeared, the New York Times carried letters from other doctors who seemed to think that Carrel was the victim of superstition or that he had lost his mind.The amazing thing about this is that Dr. Carrel had visited Lourdes several times and had personally examined pilgrims be-fore and after their cures, while his adver-saries were not even acquainted with the story of the shrine. Ordinarily, the rule of the scientist is: investigate, investigate, in-

vestigate. In the case of Lourdes, however, they refuse to investigate. Lourdes causes the scientists to act in a strangely unscien-tific manner.

More wonderful than the cures of the body that have taken place at Lourdes are the cures of the soul. "The trip to Lourdes is never made in vain", is a common saying among the bath attendants, the stretcher bearers, and the hospital workers of Lourdes. Among the uncured pilgrims this is especially evident. A person who comes to the shrine to ask his own cure usually ends up by praying for other pilgrims instead of himself. This is the typical attitude of the uncured pilgrims. It is our Lady's gift to them.

But the spiritual consolation is not con-fined to the physically afflicted. All pilgrims who approach the shrine and pray go away refreshed in spirit, more devout to Our La-dy, closer to her Son. She has left us the great shrine that is visited by a million and a half pilgrims every year - a great power-house of prayer. The number of spiritual cures that have taken place there cannot be estimated. The amount of religious fervor that has been generated cannot be comput-ed in statistics. The shrine has had a pro-found effect upon France and upon the world.

Taken from: The Woman Shall Conquer

– by: Don Sharkey

VISIT US ON THE WEB For up-to-date information, such as last-minute changes to the Mass schedule,

special prayer requests, and other breaking news, refer to our website at: www.rosarychapel.net

NOTICE TO NEWCOMERS

Founded in 1973 in the wake of the disastrous Second Vatican Council, the mission of

Our Lady of the Rosary Chapel is to maintain and restore as far as possible the tradi-

tional faith, values and liturgical practice of the Roman Catholic Church, and to provide

a haven of sanctity where men and women of good will may grow in love for God and

their neighbor.

Please don’t hesitate to introduce yourself and ask questions. After Mass come to the Social Hall, and join us for coffee and refreshments. We hope your visit with us is a pleasant one, and we look forward to seeing you again and welcoming you as a member of Our Lady of the Rosary.

We welcome Spanish-speaking guests, and confessions are heard in Spanish and English every Sunday and by appointment with the pastor.

OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY CHAPEL

We are missing some Mass intentions to complete the Gregorian Mass for the repose of the soul of Marietta Costanzo, if you are able. Thank you for your generosity.

Fr. Rodriguez.