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The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes or the Domain (as it is most commonly known) is an area of ground surrounding the Catholic shrine (Grotto) to Our Lady of Lourdes in the town of Lourdes, France. The Sanctuary is a destination for pilgrimage; sick pilgrims are reputed to be miraculously healed by Lourdes water. This ground is owned and administrated by the Roman Catholic Church, and has several functions, including devotional activities, offices, and accommodation for sick pilgrims and their helpers. The Domain includes the Grotto itself, the nearby taps which dispense the Lourdes water, and the offices of the Lourdes Medical Bureau, as well as several churches and basilicas. It comprises an area of 51 hectares, and includes 22 separate places of worship.〔http://www.lourdes-france.org/index.php?goto_centre=ru&contexte=en&id=431&id_rubrique=431〕 There are six official languages of the Sanctuary: French, English, Italian, Spanish, Dutch and German. Grottos intended as replicas of the one at Our Lady of Lourdes, and other grottos in honour of Our Lady of Lourdes, are often described as "Lourdes grottos". ==History== Beginning on 11 February 1858, a 14-year-old peasant girl named Bernadette Soubirous claimed to have experienced a series of apparitions of a girl dressed in white and with a blue belt around her waist, who eventually introduced herself as the Immaculate Conception, a name by which the Virgin Mary was known. On land bordered by a loop of the Gave de Pau river is an outcrop of rock called Massabielle, (from ''masse vieille'': "old mass"). On the northern aspect of this rock, near the river bank, is a naturally occurring, irregularly shaped shallow cave or grotto, in which the apparitions took place.〔Ruth Harris, ''Lourdes: Body and Spirit in the Secular Age'', Penguin Books, 1999, p. 52.〕 At the time of the apparitions, the grotto lay well outside town, on common ground which was used by the villagers variously for pasturing animals, collecting firewood, and as a garbage dump, and it had a reputation for being an unpleasant place.〔Ruth Harris, ''Lourdes: Body and Spirit in the Secular Age'', Penguin Books, 1999, p. 53.〕 The figure always appeared in one place, a niche above the main cavity of the grotto, in which a wild rose bush was growing. Among the instructions from 'the Virgin' were "Go and drink from the spring", "Go and tell the priests to build a chapel here", and "Have the people come here in procession". These three instructions in particular were to prove pivotal in the development of the Domain and its ceremonies. Public interest in the apparitions grew, and curious visitors began to be replaced by pilgrims from increasingly far away, drawn by compelling stories of apparitions and miracles. A local priest, Abbé Dominique Peyramale, together with his bishop, Monsignor Bertrand-Sévère Mascarou Laurence, bought the grotto and the land around it from the commune in 1861, 3 years after the apparitions. Immediately they set about modifying the area to make it more accessible to visitors, and started work to build the first of the churches, which is now known as the Crypt. In 1864, the Lyonnais sculptor Joseph-Hugues Fabisch was commissioned to create a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes based on Bernadette's descriptions. Although it has become an iconic symbol of Our Lady of Lourdes, it depicts a figure which is not only older and taller than Bernadette's description, but also more in keeping with orthodox and traditional representations of the Virgin Mary. The statue rests in the niche where the Virgin appeared to Bernadette. The original wild rose bush was destroyed shortly after the apparitions by pilgrims seeking relics, but a newer one has been planted nearby.〔Oliver Todd, ''The Lourdes Pilgrim'', Matthew James Publishing, 2003, p. 41.〕 Due to French political upheaval resulting in an enforced separation of Church and State, the property and grounds of the Domain were confiscated from the Church and returned to the ownership of the town in 1910. The then bishop, Mgr. François-Xavier Schoepfer, contested this confiscation, and was permitted to rent the Domain from the town until the outbreak of World War I in 1914.〔Ruth Harris, ''Lourdes: Body and Spirit in the Secular Age'', Penguin Books, 1999, p. 365.〕 Later, a visit to Lourdes by Marshal Pétain in 1941 provided official recognition of the Domain. Church officials successfully petitioned Pétain to allow the Church to reclaim ownership of the Domain.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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