Surprise hit ‘Lourdes’ documentary, captures miracles of a different sort

The U.S. tour follows the film’s debut in France, where in 2020 it was nominated for best documentary at the Cesar Awards. Tickets for the Feb. 8 and 9 showings can be purchased online at Fathom Events or at participating theatre box offices. 

As many as 6 million people visit Lourdes each year to pray and to touch, bathe in and drink from the spring water that flows under the grotto where the apparitions of the Virgin first took place. More than 7,000 cures have been attributed to the intercession of Our Lady of Lourdes, with 70 officially recognized by the Catholic Church. A 15-minute long “bonus” film following the presentation of the movie, distributed by Spain’s Bosco Films, features a Catholic physician discussing the miraculous cures attributed to Lourdes.

The movie “Lourdes,” however, is not exactly a movie about miracles. Audiences eager to be blown away by visible proof of the existence of a loving God who answers prayers may at first be disappointed when they realize it is not that kind of movie. What follows are miracles of a different sort: the gift of faith that makes possible peace and even joy through suffering, and the exercise of loving one’s neighbour in charity and compassion.

“Lourdes” is not always easy to watch – not only because it’s uncomfortable to see suffering at such close range, but because the unfamiliarity with that feeling is an indication that one tends to go through life avoiding being exposed to it.

A despondent teenage girl has come on an annual pilgrimage with her unemployed father to bathe in Lourdes’ spring water. Her father hopes to cure her of the cysts forming in her arm, but she prays before the statue of the Virgin Mary for relief from the kids who bully her at school.

A volunteer at Lourdes pilgrims sharing a laugh with a pilgrim. Bosco Films

A mother and father travel by bus with their 40-year-old son who can’t stand or feed himself, as his mother confesses that she still blames herself for the accident that changed their lives forever.

A father and his son, who himself is sick, seek healing for a terminally ill younger brother suffering from a painful skin condition. The faith of the two is palpable as is that of the boys’ mother who manages to radiate joy as she sees them off.

A man afflicted in the last stages of ALS explains that he is grateful for the gift of peace he feels he has been given.

The inspiration for the movie came from its writer, veteran journalist Sixtine Léon-Dufour, who first went to Lourdes as a volunteer, very reluctantly, on the occasion of her mother-in-law’s 70th birthday. Once there, she was profoundly moved by the work, bathing, dressing, feeding, and talking to the pilgrims, and now returns with her family every year.

When she is volunteering at Lourdes, she is struck by the faith of the pilgrims, who, she said, come for consolation more than for a cure.

“What they all say is that when you go to the grotto and you spend some time praying — or not — at the feet of this statue of the Virgin Mary, you find peace, a real peace,” she said.

Léon-Dufour told CNA that she thinks the sick and disabled find Lourdes a respite from what can be a cruel world.

“To be able to be in that place without any judgment from society because you are surrounded by disabled people, sick people. The poor, ‘the invisibles’ are on the front stage, which doesn’t happen in our real lives. Here in Lourdes, you don’t have any judgment. So I think that the first cure you can get is that you don’t have ‘funny eyes’ on you.”

“And oh, all the people you will find on your way! Either they’re as sick as you or as poor as you. Either. They’re here just to help you,” she said.