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Bernadette Soubirous ( January 7, 1844 - April 16, 1879) was a visionary and nun from the town of Lourdes in southern France. Her visions made the town a major site for pilgrimages. After her death, she was canonized as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church.

Bernadette was the daughter of François Soubirous, a miller, and the oldest of six children; they lived in hard poverty. At the age of fourteen, in 1858, Bernadette saw the first of eighteen visions of the Blessed Virgin Mary at a rock called Massabielle in Lourdes. Mary told Bernadette to drink from the spring that flowed under the rock. The other content of Bernadette's visions was simple, and focused on the need for prayerPrayer is an effort to communicate with a God, or to some deity or deities, either to offer praise to the deity, to make a request of the deity, or simply to express one's thoughts and emotions to the deity. There are a variety approaches to understanding and penancePenance comprises actions required to complete a confession, such as an act of prayer or an act of restoration to the wronged party. Penance is set by the priest who hears the confession. In eastern religions ( Hinduism, etc. acts of hardship committed on.

Bernadette was a sickly child; she suffered most of her life from tuberculosisTuberculosis is also called TB consumption (TB seemed to consume people from within with its symptoms of bloody cough, fever, pallor, and long relentless wasting), wasting disease White Plague (TB sufferers appeared markedly pale), phthisis (Greek for con, and some of the people who interviewed her following her revelation of the visions thought her simple-minded. But despite being rigorously interviewed by officials of both the Roman Catholic Church and the French government, she stuck consistently by her story.

Still, disliking the attention she was attracting, she became a nun in the Sisters of Notre Dame de Nevers, in whose convent she spent the rest of her brief life. She eventually died of her illness at the age of thirty-five. She took no notice of the development of Lourdes as a pilgrimage shrineA shrine is a holy or sacred place sometimes dedicated towards a certain god, goddess, saint, or similar religious figure. As distinguished from a temple, a shrine is usually located because it houses a particular relic or cult image which is the object o, and was not present for the consecration of the basilicaThe Latin word, basilica (derived from Greek basilike sto royal stoa , was originally used to describe a Roman public building (as in Greece, mainly a tribunal), usually located at the centre of a Roman town ( Forum). In Hellenistic cities, public basilic there in 1876Events January events January 31 The United States orders all Native Americans to move into reservations. February events February 2 The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs of Major League Baseball is formed. February 14 Alexander Graham Bell a.

She was canonized in 1933Centuries: 19th century 20th century 21st century Decades: 1880s 1890s 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s Years: 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 See also 1933 in aviation 1933 in film 1933 in literature 1933 in mu, not so much for the content of her visions, but rather for her simplicity and holiness of life. One miracle that was cited in support of the cause for her sainthood was that her body was exhumed and found to be "incorrupt" — preserved from decomposition, perhaps by supernatural means. It was transferred to a reliquary in her shrine. Her life was given a fictional treatment in Franz Werfel's novel The Song of Bernadette, which later was made into a motion picture.