A Few More Photos From Lourdes...

A little selection of the photos I took this year...

First of all, is there anywhere round here that sells rosaries or statues...?

Mass in the St. Gabriel Chapel - the plaques on the wall are in thanksgiving for prayers answered, or requests for prayers for the benefactors' intentions...

The first Mass in the chapel was a "catechetical Mass" celebrated by Fr. Charles, while Fr. Tim explained what was happening to the younger children, and led some prayers (such as an Act of Contrition) at appropriate points...

The weather was a bit grim, which made the photos a little more "atmospheric"

We had one Mass in the austere but beautiful Crypt of the parish church...

Dean Peyramale has a statue outside the church...

...and I think that he is buried in the Crypt.

I always thought it strange that, although he was portrayed very harshly in the accounts I'd read of the life of St. Bernadette, there were quite a few positive references to Dean Peyramale in the town, as well as the statue outside the parish church. The newer film about St. Bernadette (the one starring Sydney Perry) shows him in a much kinder light, and, given how positively he is represented in the town of Lourdes, it is probably more accurate.

I can hardly believe that it's only been a week since we returned... roll on next year's trip!

Presents From My Kittens...

So far I've had a live baby bird, a live stag beetle, at least one live mouse (one rescued and released, and at least one other, probably now dead somewhere in the house) and one definitely dead mouse (not chewed)...

I suspect that Miaowrini is the one who goes hunting, but I'm not entirely sure.

I need to train them to bring me a nice cheezburger...

A Visit From Our Transatlantic Cousins...

I was on the Woolwich Free Ferry the other day, when a blast from a horn alerted me to the fact that we had a visitor from across the pond...

I apologize for the quality of the photo - but the iPhone has an awful camera. I just didn't expect to see the U.S. Coast Guard sailing up the Thames, or I'd have made sure to have my trusty digital camera to hand. The unusualness of the event is testified to by the two cyclists who abandoned their bikes in order to catch a photo opportunity!

Rumours...

There are rumours circulating... I have heard that CAFOD has taken to cold-calling previous donors, and has been putting pressure on in order to raise funds...

If CAFOD wants to enjoy a privileged position as a Catholic charity with collections taken at Masses, it should have to support Catholic teaching...

Bartrès...

Wednesday morning was the nicest one we had weather-wise, though it was a little breezy. This was very good news, as it was the morning we were due to go to Bartrès. We were so fortunate to have Mass in the parish church there. It was all the more poignant for me to realise that St. Bernadette would have recognised the church as it was - the one in Lourdes burned down and was rebuilt in a slightly different location, and the Crypt of the Immaculate Conception basilica (just above the Grotto) had only just been built when St. Bernadette left Lourdes to join the convent at Nevers, so she never saw the other chapels there.

I took a few photos, but not during Mass, as I was leading the singing, and manipulating a camera and various bits of music at the same time is not a skill I possess...

At the end of Mass, Fr. Tim brought out a sample of St. Bernadette's handwriting exercises...

...and we were able to venerate a relic of St. Bernadette...

Something I hadn't spotted on previous visits to Bartrès (despite it being bang smack in the middle of the graveyard) - the grave of Marie Lagües, the foster-mother of St. Bernadette.

St. Bernadette's own mother couldn't breastfeed her due to burns to her breasts in an accident with a candle. Marie Lagües had just lost her own baby, and so agreed to act as wetnurse for a small fee - the family were reasonably well-off at this point.

Later, when the family became destitute and St. Bernadette's health took a turn for the worse, it was decided that she should go to live in the relatively healthier air of Bartrès, where, in return for looking after the sheep and helping with her foster-mother's children, St. Bernadette would be taught her catechism, learn to read and write and be fed a better diet. In fact, due to her tiredness after her day's work and her ill health, St. Bernadette found learning very difficult, and Marie Lagües was not a patient tutor, so the bargain wasn't kept. When the parish priest at Bartrès left to join a monastery, St. Bernadette decided that she would be better off back with her family. Shortly after her return, she saw Our Lady for the first time.

The Lagües' family house has been preserved as a museum, and St. Bernadette's little cot-bed can be seen...

The photos of the interior aren't as clear as I'd like because the room is behind glass - presumably to deter relic-hunters from denuding the place!

I had planned to allow time in Bartrès after Mass for lunch and exploration of the museum and surrounding area. There was, I'd noted last year, a nice little café / restaurant which looked like it would be good. Alas, the best-laid plans of mice and men, and all that... The museum was only one room (and a gift-shop) and it closed at 12noon for a two-hour lunch-break. Fortunately we'd had plenty of time to see the room before Mass. Then, rather embarrassingly for me (as organiser), it transpired that Wednesday was the chef's day off, and no food was available...

My fellow pilgrims were very understanding, and didn't utter a single word of reproach. The grandmother of the group had packed supplies, and several families wandered off to explore the surrounding area - I believe they did find somewhere that did food. I went for the easy option, and chose to stay for a glass of lager, safe in the knowledge that I'd be able to enjoy a late lunch back in Lourdes. Nevertheless, I was completely flummoxed by this!

The café owner had probably noted that Wednesday was his quietest day - most pilgrimage groups attend the Wednesday morning International Mass and then return to their hotels for lunch. To be fair, he explained that, should we wish to arrange a visit in future, he'd give the chef a different day off that week...

No-One Goes On Processions Any More...

It is, after all, not done any more, not by "thinking" Catholics (like the ones who read The Suppository, aka The Bitter Pill.)

On the way to the start of the (not very popular) procession...

And then, by this point, we hadn't actually started the rosary...

It's when you meet the people at the start of the procession coming back after walking right around the Domaine that you realise that quite a few people do, actually, still go on processions... and remember that we were in the front end of the middle section...

My knee was playing up because of the damp weather, so I went and sat down at the outskirts of the procession, which wasn't the best position from which to take photos...

Each of those little dots of light is a separate candle, and lots of people didn't have candles...

And, at the end...

Fr. Tim has one of the most impressive photos of the (non-existent) procession on his Flickr page...

My Favourite Hotel...

I always think that this hotel foyer looks as if it is straight out of an Agatha Christie novel. I half expect to see a body draped artistically at the bottom of the stairs, or a police-type chalk outline on the floor.

Patrick and Sylvie Bonsom make a wonderful brother-and-sister team running the Grand Hotel d'Angleterre at Lourdes. Sylvie's husband is the chef, I think. One of their employees, Odette, has been Night Duty Porter for all the years we have been staying there. And when they were younger, we'd see a couple of children (I never figured out whose) doing homework at one of the tables in the afternoons. It's a superb hotel, with a friendly atmosphere. It's also about as close to the Grotto as you can get without pitching a tent in the field next to the Hemicycle!

The black arrow on the left shows the entrance to the hotel... the one on the right shows the St. Joseph's Gate, one of the main entrances to the Domaine and the quickest way to the Grotto.

I've already booked the hotel for our pilgrimage next year...

Modern Technology...

"Father Gadget" (as he used to be known by some of the teenagers in the parish) spotted a rather cool gadget in the airport Duty-Free section. Yes, I know it's no longer "Duty-Free" since the EU abolished it, but I don't know what else to call the consumer-fest section located between Security and the Boarding Gate.

Anyway, this particular gadget - an accessory for his mobile phone - caused quite a stir amongst some of the other passengers on the flight to Toulouse, especially when he stopped to take a call...