St. Bernadette relics tour to stop in Baltimore May 12-15

The relics of St. Bernadette will make a timely stop in Baltimore this May, visiting a cathedral named for the Blessed Virgin Mary, who appeared to the saint more than a century and a half ago.

Items relating to the Marian visionary of Lourdes, France, will begin a tour of the United States for the first time in April.

The tour will make a stop in Baltimore May 12-15 at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen in Homeland. The relics will be available for viewing most of the day for three straight days at the cathedral, 5200 N. Charles St.

Father Louis Bianco, rector of the cathedral, said the event could draw quite a crowd since it is the only Mid-Atlantic stop for the tour that begins April 7 in Florida.

“It should be a special opportunity,” Father Bianco said. “Not everyone can go to Lourdes, France; so this is a great opportunity to bring a bit of the Lourdes experience to the U.S.”

He noted that the “malades” – persons who are ill, suffering from a disease or health problem – will be able to get the full Lourdes experience in Baltimore – prayer, celebration of Mass, anointing of the sick, confession and sprinkling of water from Lourdes.

The stop at the cathedral was spearheaded by the Baltimore chapter of the Order of Malta. It was quite fortuitous that Baltimore landed a stop on the tour, which primarily is going to churches dedicated to St. Bernadette or Our Lady of Lourdes.

Julia Stamerro, a parishioner of St. Paul in Ellicott City and a member of the Order of Malta Federal Association, was connecting with a friend to whom she had not spoken in a while who works at Lourdes. The friend told her of the upcoming tour and helped her arrange the Baltimore stop.

The Order of Malta usually sponsors a pilgrimage each spring to Lourdes, France, for physical and spiritual healing. The trips have been canceled the past three years because of the pandemic.

“It’s really a bit of a miracle,” Stammero said. “We always went to Lourdes in May and haven’t been able to go the past three years. Our mission is to minister to the poor, sick and prisoners. A lot of that has been put on hold or changed because of COVID. This gives a lot of sick people the opportunity to witness what we do.”

The U.S. visit will begin in South Florida at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Miami, with a morning welcome Mass April 7. The next day the relics will visit St. Bernadette Church in Hollywood, Fla., then return to Our Lady of Lourdes Church.

The relics will go to two other Florida dioceses, Palm Beach and St. Petersburg, and then zigzag across the country to 23 other dioceses, visiting 34 churches, cathedrals and shrines. The last stop is St. Bernadette Church in Los Angeles, July 31-Aug. 4.

The full schedule of the relics’ U.S. tour can be found at stbernadetteusa.org.

“I saw a great opportunity here, particularly with the current state of our world,” said Monsignor Kenneth Schwanger, pastor of Miami’s Our Lady of Lourdes Parish, who was instrumental in making this tour happen. “I started calling parishes across the country with the names of Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Bernadette to make them aware of this grace,” he said, and the result is the upcoming tour.

The tour has been in the works for more than three years. For the relics to visit, a request was made to the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes in France. However, the request was delayed because of the pandemic.

The Vatican has granted a plenary indulgence for those visiting the relics during the tour. 

On Feb. 11, 1858, a “lady in white” began her 18 visits to a poor, uneducated 14-year-old girl, Bernadette Soubirous, in the obscure town of Lourdes in southern France – population 4,100 – at the Grotto of Massabielle. Over the course of six months, the lady asked Bernadette to come and visit her.

“I do not promise you the happiness of this world but of the other,” the “lady in white” told Bernadette, who became the messenger to the local community, the priests and the bishop of Tarbes, France. She would appear 18 times to the young girl.

On the 16th apparition, Bernadette asked the “lady” her name, to which she replied: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”

Bernadette left Lourdes to live out her religious vocation within the community of the Sisters of Charity of Nevers in 1866. She saw the chapel completed but never returned to Lourdes. She died in 1879, was proclaimed blessed in 1925 and was canonized in 1933.

Her body, exhumed in April 1925 for her beatification, was found to be uncorrupted. Fragments of the fifth and sixth vertebrae were removed and reserved for veneration by the faithful.

Email Gerry Jackson at gjackson@catholicreview.org

Catholic News Service contributed to this article.

Reliquary of Saint Bernadette, U.S. Tour 2022

Cathedral of Mary Our Queen Schedule

Thursday, May 12
4 p.m. — Public Veneration of the Relics begins
4:30 p.m. — Sacrament of Reconciliation
5:30 p.m. — Mass
6-7 p.m. — Veneration of the Relics

Friday, May 13      

2-2:30 p.m. – Students of the Cathedral School visit and venerate the Relics

2:30-4:40 p.m. – Veneration is open to the public

4:30 p.m. – Confessions available

5:30 p.m. – Mass

6-7 p.m. – Veneration

 Saturday, May 14

7:30 a.m-3 p.m. – Veneration with Malta Honor Guard in attendance

8:15 a.m. – Mass

3-5 p.m. – Confession available; anointing of the sick; rosary

5 p.m. – Mass with Archbishop William E. Lori, including the sprinkling of Lourdes water (Mass will be televised)

6:15 p.m. – Procession following Mass with statue of the Blessed Mother  

6:45-8 p.m. – Veneration  

Sunday, May 15

7-8 a.m. – Veneration

8, 9:30, 11 a.m. – Masses

Noon-2 p.m. – Veneration of relics

2:15 p.m. – Closing Benediction and recessional of relics 

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