France is currently in a state of emergency, which is part of the French government’s response to the recent spate of terrorist attacks on its soil. As part of this general tightening up of security, special measures were in place in Lourdes over the weekend, and especially on Monday, August 15, the feast of the Assumption, which is a national holiday in France and which typically sees large crowds at the shrine of Our Lady at the foot of the Pyrenees.
None of the security measures taken is designed to be disruptive to the pilgrims visiting the shrine, and all such measures will be accepted as both necessary precautions and a sign of the times we live in. They also serve as a salutary reminder that Lourdes must inevitably be a target for the terrorists, just as much as Fr Hamel saying Mass was. Those who claim, against all the evidence, that this is not a religious war, need to bear this in mind.
But if this is the Age of Terrorism, it is also, as far as the Catholic Church is concerned, the Age of Lourdes. Terrorism is warfare directed at the defenceless civilian, designed to undermine the state whose duty is to protect the citizen. Terrorism clearly has no care for the person, and ISIS puts the corporate demands of the so-called Caliphate over and above any individual claim for compassion or mercy. Lourdes by contrast mediates other values.
Saint Bernadette was born into a desperately poor family living on the margins of society, as anyone who visits the place where she lived – the cachot, a disused lock-up – can see. Yet this was the child whom God called and to whom the message was entrusted. Indeed, Bernadette does not simply bear the message, she is part of the message. It is the same message that is contained in the Magnificat, the song of Our Lady, namely that God chooses to exalt the weak and humble the proud.
This same message is seen every day in Lourdes, where the sick and the suffering are treated as honoured guests. Lourdes inverts the usual order of the world in both words and practice: in Lourdes the last come first, and the first last.
The French bishops have spoken of fraternity and dialogue as the weapons of combat to use against ISIS. Whatever this may mean, it is important that we show the world the gulf that exists between the Kingdom of God, as exemplified by Lourdes, and ISIS. One is full of pride, worships power and will use violence to secure it. The other treasures humility, and its favoured course of action is charity to all. The perceived threat to the shrine of Lourdes puts this difference into sharp relief.
The Catholic ideal presents a firm rebuttal to the ideology of the so-called Islamic State. Contrary to ISIS, we need to insist on the superiority of charity over violence, humility over pride, and care for all over the exaltation of a single group. Indeed, care for the single person is the only true foundation for any attempt at civil society, as the civilisations of the West still need to learn.
ISIS, based as it is on the denial of justice, cannot last, though its fall will take time. In the meantime, we can and should to look to Lourdes for inspiration and understanding of the sort of society we must aim to build.
The spirit of sport
Catholics could be forgiven for a sceptical response to the Olympics. Sport is in many ways a surrogate religion: it offers community, excitement, loyalty, dramatic stories – almost everything except the truth. Sport can bring people together, but it can also divide them, as we saw in the scenes of violence at Euro 2016. And it has often been a convenient way to distract people from real injustice. Oppressive regimes have made the most of sport. And as we report on page 11, Cafod have expressed disappointment at how the wounds of Brazilian society have been forgotten in the glitz of Rio.But we can’t be too cynical. The Olympics have brought many magnificent scenes of human exertion to our screens. And these moments have a meaning beyond themselves: as Pius XII once said in an address to sportsmen and women, “The human body is, in its own right, God’s masterpiece in the order of visible creation. The Lord has intended that it should flourish here below and enjoy immortality in the glory of heaven.”
Many holy people, not least St Paul, have seen in the beauty of sport a reflection of the spiritual life and a reminder that we are both body and soul.
Moreover, sport has played a role in the lives of many modern saints. Pope St John Paul II was a footballer and skier; Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati would go climbing in the mountains, and adopted a kind of motto – Verso l’alto, “to the heights” – which served as an encouragement in his spiritual battles as well as his attempts to scale the surrounding peaks.
It’s a nice footnote to Rio that a few of its brightest stars are also believers, not least Simone Biles, winner of three gold medals. When asked by a journalist to empty her kit bag, she did so – and a rosary fell out of it.
