Lourdes in the northern foothills of the Pyrenees
Wednesday, 4 July 2012 - 01:48 pm (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination: European Union / Europäische Union General
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Lourdes Basilica © Darreenvt
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Lourdes is a commune in the Hautes-Pyrénées department in the Midi-Pyrénées region in south-western France. Lourdes is a small market town lying in the foothills of the Pyrenees, famous for the
Marian apparitions of
Our Lady of Lourdes said to have occurred in 1858 to Bernadette Soubirous. At that time, the most prominent feature of the town was the fortified castle that rises up from a rocky escarpment at its centre.
Following the reports that Our Lady of Lourdes had appeared to Bernadette Soubirous on a total of eighteen occasions, Lourdes has developed into a major place of Roman Catholic pilgrimage and of miraculous healings . The 150th Jubilee of the first apparition took place on 11 February 2008 with an outdoor mass attended by approximately 45,000 pilgrims.
Our Lady of Lourdes © Manuel González Olaechea y Franco
Since the apparitions, Lourdes has become one of the world’s leading Catholic
Marian shrines and the number of visitors grows each year. It has such an important place within the Roman Catholic church, that
Pope John Paul II visited the shrine twice on 15 August 1983 and 14–15 August 2004. In 2007,
Pope Benedict XVI authorized special indulgences to mark the 150th anniversary of Our Lady of Lourdes.
Today Lourdes has a population of around 15,000 but is able to take in some 5,000,000 pilgrims and tourists every season. With about 270 hotels, Lourdes has the second greatest number of hotels per square kilometre in France after
Paris .
It is the joint seat of the
Diocese of Tarbes-et-Lourdes and is the largest pilgrimage site in France, the second site being the
Basilica of St. Thérèse (Lisieux), in Normandy.
Read more on
City of Lourdes ,
Pilgrimage Lourdes ,
Lourdes Tourism and
Wikipedia Lourdes . Learn more about the
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