April 16th - St. Bernadette, Visionary
Bernadette, whose complete name is Marie Bernarde Soubirous, was a child
like any other. Only her gaze was extraordinary, showing a great
innocence.
In the first apparition, she learned to make the sign of the Cross by
following the gestures of Our Lady. From the fact that she learned it from
Our Lady, witnesses used to say that during her whole life St. Bernadette
always made a sign of Cross that was unforgettable and incomparable.
In the Convent in Nevers that Bernadette later entered, some nuns were
once
insisting that she describe the cloth of the dress of Our Lady to resolve
a
quarrel. Some said it was a certain kind of material, others another.
Bernadette responded:
"I never said that the material was of this or that kind. I only said that
it was made from a material that I had never seen before. But if you are
so
interested in knowing this, why don't you ask her to appear to you and
then
you can pay attention to it."
She was a very humble person. Once someone asked her to say a few words
for
the edification of the novices. She answered smiling: "I don't know
anything! No one can take anything good from a stone."
The Mother Superior asked her if she were not proud to be chosen as a
confidante of Our Lady. She answered: "What idea do you have of me? The
Holy
Virgin only chose me because I was the most ignorant. If she could have
found someone else more ignorant, she would have chosen her."
The continuous suffering and vomiting of blood she experienced slowly
weakened Bernadette. Her physical appearance became pitiable. Once a
postulant came to see her so that she might know the seer. As the saint
passed by, a companion pointed her out and said with scorn: "Bernadette?
It's just this!" (Bernadette, c'est ça!)
Comments of the late Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira: (died 1995)
St. Bernadette Soubirous was a peasant from an area in the Pyrenees that
is
half French, half Spanish, which constitutes, from a certain point of
view,
a synthesis of France and Spain. If you pay attention to her photos - not
the sentimental statues in some churches - you find a person with a
slightly
square face with regular lines, a dark gaze, large eyes, and a certain
fixed
look that is Spanish. The French gaze is normally rapid, quickly moving to
analyze you, and then moves on to another thing. But the Spanish gaze
nails
you and remains steadfast, analyzing everything about you, a kind of
X-ray.
She also had a nose that was more Spanish than French, which gave
coherence
to her whole physiognomy. It is a line that marks the face from top to
bottom. She also had another Spanish characteristic of saying things
straightforwardly.
She was always completely at ease, like a person who does not pretend to
be
anything more that what she is. She was humble before others, but when it
came to the service of Our Lady, she did not care about the opinion of
anyone else.
She was always unpretentious. Once, when she had to stand before the
police
to explain her revelations, she impressed her interrogators with her
naturalness. But before her parents, the parish priest, and her religious
superior, she was a model of respect and obedience.
Here you have the spirit of a true Catholic, of a true saint. She never
gave
im****tance to the world's values, she didn't care about what other people
were thinking about her, be it good or bad. If someone gives im****tance to
the applause of the world, he ends by losing his liberty and relying on
the
applause to go ahead. The applause becomes the music he needs in order to
keep dancing. To be able to enjoy complete serenity, one has to be
independent of the opinion of the world. St. Bernadette Soubirous was one
who did not care about that. She used to do what her duty was according to
Holy Mother Church.
St. Bernadette converted many persons who saw her making the sign of the
Cross. She had learned to do so from Our Lady, who is the perfect model of
a
friend and lover of the Cross of Jesus Christ. For this reason St.
Bernadette also had a love for suffering and for the Cross of Our Lord
that
propitiated her to receive from Our Lady something more of her spirit when
the Virgin Mary made the sign of the Cross. Something of Our Lady's
majesty
passed to her.
Once I read a re****t by a lady of high society who witnessed St.
Bernadette
during an apparition. This lady wrote that she have never seen a young
lady
of the aristocracy who had the bearing and refinement of St. Bernadette
during the apparition, even though she was a simple peasant. This is
because
she was in communication with the Queen of Heaven and Earth, and something
of her royalty was transmitted to St. Bernadette. It was not only majesty,
but also a state of virtue that passed from Our Lady to her.
So, many people witnessing this transformation in the peasant girl
realized
that she was in contact with some person whom they did not see, but whom
they sensed was there. They realized that this person was Our Lady and
many
of them converted. It is an interesting principle to consider that the
true
devotee of Our Lady receives something of her in his soul and his bearing.
There is a certain communication from her to him.
The answers she gave to the nuns in the selection are indicative of her
vivacious personality and sense of humor. She was a keen polemicist and
sometimes her responses were sharp.
About her humility, what she said about herself was true. Our Lady chose
her
because she was the most ignorant in Lourdes. Her ignorance was notable
and
stood as one proof of the veracity of the revelations, because she could
never have imagined them. She was a simple, unlearned person who could not
have known on her own the things she said Our Lady told her, and she could
not even fully understand some parts of the revelations. Her ignorance
stood
as an im****tant argument in favor of the Lourdes apparitions.
Finally, she was short and even if she had a lively spirit, she did not
stand out readily. Then she became sick and her physical appearance used
to
give a bad impression, which is why she was scorned by some of her
companions.
The selection does not say, but an im****tant aspect of her life is that
she
offered all her suffering for the sanctification of a certain person. No
one
knows who this mysterious sinner was, because she never revealed the name.
Probably it was a soul that Divine Providence showed to her and asked her
to
suffer for. Was he a man from her time, or someone from the future? No one
knows.
Another curious point in her live re****ted in good biographies is that Our
Lady revealed a secret to her, but Bernadette never said a word about the
content. Perhaps the secret was related to that mysterious sinner for whom
she was asked to suffer. So, in the three great apparitions of Our Lady -
La
Salette, Lourdes and Fatima - there were secrets transmitted by her.
Let us ask St. Bernadette to give us a great devotion to Our Lady, a
devotion like hers that had something of the virtue of Our Lady. Let us
also
ask her to protect one of her sister seers, Sister Lucy of Fatima, and
give
her the strength to be faithful to her mission. Something that is always
reason for concern is the fight Sister Lucia has to make to be faithful to
the secret she knows.
See Images at:
http://www.traditioninaction.org/SOD/j068sdBernadette4-16.htm
Saint Quote:
"Man's value before God is estimated by the dispositions of his heart, its
uprightness, its good-will, its charity, and not by keenness of intellect
or
extent of knowledge."
-Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich
Bible Quote:
4 For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the
victory which overcometh the world, our faith. 5 Who is he that overcometh
the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?
(1 John 5:4-5)
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Prayer to St. Dymphna - Justice
Admirable St. Dymphna, how just you were to all whom you
encountered, and how careful you were to give every person
his due, and more than he might desire or expect. By your
power with God please come to assist us to be just to all we
meet, and even to be generous in giving everyone more than
strict justice requires. Amen.
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