The Story Begins

Dear Diary,
 
This evening I read further in Our Lady of Lourdes, and it seemed the quiet beginning of Bernadette’s great story had opened before me.

It was February 11, 1858, in Lourdes. The day was cold and gray, with only a few drops of rain, and while many people were getting ready for the pleasures before Lent, the Soubirous family had almost nothing. They were so poor that there was not even wood enough to cook their little meal.

Bernadette had only been home with her family about two weeks. She had been living in Bartrès, watching sheep and praying her Rosary in the lonely fields. She was fourteen, but small and weak from asthma, and she still had not made her First Communion. She could not read or write, and she knew very little catechism, except the simple prayers of the Chaplet.

Still, there was something beautiful about her. She was poor and hidden, but pure and gentle, like the smallest lamb she loved best.

When her mother told Bernadette's sister Marie to go gather wood by the Gave, Bernadette begged to go too. Her mother was afraid the cold would make her cough worse, but at last she let her go. Bernadette put on her white capulet, and then she, Marie, and Jeanne Abadie started out to find wood.

That is where the story begins — not with anything grand, but with poor girls going out because there was no firewood at home. I kept thinking how Heaven must have been watching that little walk. Bernadette did not know that this ordinary errand would lead her to the Grotto, and that everything in her life was about to change.

As I read, I almost felt Bernadette beside me on the step. Not frightening, but quiet and kind, like an imaginary friend who understands little prayers, poor places, and the feeling of being small. I felt a kinship with her, as if she were not so far away after all.

Maybe Our Lady loves to come close to the humble, and maybe Jesus sees the hidden children first.

Evening Prayer

Dear Jesus,

please give me a simple heart like Bernadette’s.

Help me to love Our Lady,
to say my prayers faithfully,
and to trust that You are near
even on ordinary days.

Bless Sister Mary Claire, Father LeRoy, Robert, Mini,
and all of us at Camp Littlemore tonight.

Amen.

Bernadette's Four Prayers