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Inspiring the Archdiocese of Baltimore

The body of visionary St. Bernadette (Soubirous) of Lourdes is seen through a glass encasement at the convent where she died in 1879 in Nevers, France. The Virgin Mary appeared to the 14-year-old French peasant Marie Bernarde Soubirous at Lourdes beginning in 1858. St. Bernadette entered the convent at Nevers at age 22 and remained there until her death at age 35. Her feast is April 16. (OSV News photo/Joann S. Keane)

Relics of St. Bernadette will come to Archdiocese of Baltimore in late September


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Special to the Catholic Review Filed Under: Feature, Local News, News, Saints

Catholics throughout the Archdiocese of Baltimore will receive their second opportunity in less than five years to encounter, venerate and pray with the relics of a saint who has led countless Catholics to Christ through the Blessed Mother.

A reliquary of St. Bernadette will make visits to three sites within the archdiocese in September, some of the earliest parts of a national journey the relics will take in the next 12 months.

The first comes Sept. 22-23 at the National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Emmitsburg. Pilgrims can then venerate her twice in the immediate Baltimore area, Sept. 24-25 at the Pastorate of Christ the King (Glen Burnie) and St. Bernadette in Severn, and Sept. 26-27 at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen in Homeland. The saint’s relics last traveled to Baltimore in May 2022. 

“Most people are unable to travel to Lourdes, so we are bringing Lourdes to them right here,” said Father Louis Bianco, the cathedral’s rector.

“The experience of saints’ relics is very powerful. We pray through the intercession of the saints who stand before God. Because God became human in Jesus Christ, the physical world is sanctified, and God frequently chooses to communicate grace through physical touch and material objects.”

Toni Pallatto, the U.S. representative for the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes near Tarbes in southern France, said that the relics will include two rib fragments, a sample of muscle from her right femur, parts of her hair, and various muscles and skin fragments.

St. Bernadette Soubirous is pictured in this undated photo provided by the Sanctuaries of Our Lady of Lourdes in Lourdes, France. (OSV News photo/Durand, courtesy of Sanctuaries of Our Lady of Lourdes)

The relics will also include kneecaps, which she would have used to kneel in worshiping God when Our Lady appeared to her 18 times beginning in February 1858 when she was just 14 years old. 

“Mary understood Bernadette completely,” Pallatto said. “(Bernadette) was not a queen or a king. She was a very poor child (and) ordinary, just like each one of us. And yet Mary chose her, Our Lady chose her, to convey this message to the priests, ‘Come in procession, build a church here, penance, penance, penance.’”

The 16th appearance of Our Lady to St. Bernadette led to her identifying herself as the Immaculate Conception, something which had become church dogma just four years beforehand. That truth led people in her vicinity to immediately believe St. Bernadette that the Virgin Mary had appeared.

St. Bernadette eventually lived out her calling with the Sisters of Charity of Nevers in 1866, lived until 1879, and was canonized in 1933.

Pallatto said that they have had more than 500 requests from parishes to host the relics of St. Bernadette on this journey to the United States. Yet she reached out to Father T. Austin Murphy Jr., who leads the Pastorate of Christ the King in Glen Burnie and St. Bernadette in Severn, before most of those requests came in. 

“I just got an email and a phone call out of the blue asking if we would be interested in hosting the relics of St. Bernadette. And I was like, ‘I didn’t know about the tour,’” he said about the call Pallatto made to suggest hosting her relics at the parish bearing her name.

“For us to have her at our parish, which is named for her, calls us back to [how] the name or the patron of a place should say something to the spirit and the mission of a parish.”

The relics will be in the Archdiocese of Washington before coming to the Archdiocese of Baltimore. After leaving the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, the relics will head to St. Thomas of Villanova Church on the campus of Villanova University, Pope Leo XIV’s alma mater.

The schedule of the reliquary of St. Bernadette visits in the archdiocese is as follows:

Tuesday, Sept. 22 to Wednesday, Sept. 23: National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes, 16300 Grotto Road, Emmittsburg

Sept. 22 
  • 9 a.m. – Open for public veneration in St. Mary’s Glass Chapel
  • 11 a.m. – Mass in St. Mary’s Glass Chapel
  • 11:45 a.m. – Rosary procession with the Relic of St. Bernadette; opportunities for confession
  • 4:30 p.m. – Public veneration concludes
  • 5 p.m. – Shrine closes
Sept. 23
  • 9 a.m. – Open for public veneration in St. Mary’s Glass Chapel
  • 11 a.m. – Mass in St. Mary’s Glass Chapel
  • 11:45 a.m. – Rosary and opportunities for confession
  • 4:30 p.m. – Public veneration concludes
  • 5 p.m. – Shrine closes

Thursday, Sept. 24, to Saturday, Sept. 26: Pastorate of Christ the King and St. Bernadette, 801 Stevenson Rd., Severn

Sept. 24
  • 10 a.m. – Relics arrive at St. Bernadette Church, with a welcoming celebration
  • Noon – Angelus, then exposition of Blessed Sacrament
  • 1:30 p.m. – Rosary
  • 2 p.m. – Benediction and liturgy of anointing of the sick
  • 3 p.m. – Divine Mercy chaplet
  • 4 p.m. – Confessions available until 6 p.m.
  • 6 p.m. – Angelus
  • 7 p.m. – Evening prayer service in Spanish/bilingual
  • 8:30 p.m. – Public veneration ends
Sept. 25
  • 7 a.m. – Votive Mass of the saints
  • 7:30 a.m. – Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament
  • 10 a.m. – Rosary, with Benediction at 10:30 a.m.
  • 11 a.m. – Daytime prayer service (in English)
  • Noon – Angelus
  • 1 p.m. – Liturgy of anointing of the sick
  • 3 p.m. – Divine Mercy chaplet
  • 6 p.m. – Angelus
  • 7 p.m. – Evening prayer service (in Spanish/bilingual)
  • 8:30 p.m. – Public veneration ends

Sept. 26                                                                  

  • 8:30 a.m. – Mass
  • 10 a.m. – Rosary
  • 11 a.m. – Closing service
  • Noon – Relics depart for the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen

Saturday, Sept. 26 to Sunday, Sept. 27, Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, 5200 N. Charles St., Homeland

Sept. 26

  • 4 p.m. – Confessions and public veneration begin
  • 5 p.m. – Mass and outdoor procession with the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, with cathedral open for veneration and confessions
  • 8 p.m. – Public veneration ends

Sept. 27

  • 7 a.m. – Veneration begins
  • 7:30 a.m. – The sacrament of confession available and continuing throughout the day
  • 8 a.m. – Mass
  • 9:15 a.m. – Mass
  • 11 a.m. – Mass celebrated by Archbishop William E. Lori
  • 2 p.m. – Filipino Fiesta Mass with Archbishop Lori as presider, with procession of Filipino saints
  • Immediately following the procession until 8 p.m. – Public veneration of St. Bernadette’s relics 

Click here for more information or for details on other tour locations around the country.

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