Pope Leo's Lourdes Visit Recalls Trips by John Paul II and Benedict XVI

Preparations are underway at the Lourdes sanctuary in southwestern France for a visit by Pope Leo XIV, drawing attention to the pilgrimages made by his predecessors to the shrine associated with miraculous cures.

According to the Bishop of Lourdes and Tarbes, Jean-Marc Micas, the pope will arrive as both pilgrim and pastor. On reaching Lourdes on Saturday evening, he is expected to go straight to the Grotto of the Apparitions of Massabielle, where he will touch the rock, drink the water, light a candle and kneel in silent prayer, following the same gestures as other pilgrims.

Vatican analyst Marco Politi said the visit to France and Lourdes is intended to underscore the importance of Europe and the role of the European Union in world politics. He noted that Pope Francis had neglected Western Europe in favour of the peripheries of the Catholic community, and that Pope Leo has now decided to care again for Western Europe, where believers have become a minority in society.

Past papal trips to Lourdes have carried their own messages. When John Paul II visited in 1983, he was full of energy, greeting the faithful and leading a three-hour mass. He had survived an assassination attempt and credited the Virgin Mary with saving his life. Politi recalled that the pope spoke to the crowds about peace and justice, urging Catholics not to yield to atheism or materialism.

John Paul II returned in 2004, when his health had deteriorated sharply. Suffering from Parkinson's disease, he was barely able to speak and used a special armchair or wheelchair. Politi described the trip as a dramatic experience, with the pope's words at mass almost impossible to understand, and said it felt like a final journey to thank Mary.

Benedict XVI visited in 2008, when the sanctuary marked the 150th anniversary of the apparitions of the Virgin Mary to Bernadette Soubirous. Politi said Benedict described Lourdes as a special place where one meets the loving face of God and shares in service to the suffering.

The shrine draws millions of visitors each year, many of them disabled or seriously ill and hoping for a miracle. During Benedict's visit, mosaics by the religious artist Rev. Marko Ivan Rupnik featured at the sanctuary. Rupnik was declared excommunicated in 2020 for using the confessional to absolve a woman with whom he had engaged in sexual activity, and in 2023 Lourdes officials set up a study group to decide what to do with the mosaics. Some of the mosaics at the basilica's lower entrance have since been covered up.

Laura Sgro, a lawyer for five women who say they were abused by Rupnik, said the abuse was intertwined with the creation of his artworks. She said one client, Sister Samuelle, reported being molested on scaffolding while a mosaic was being made inside a church, and another, Gloria Branciani, said she posed for Rupnik in a painting later exhibited in a place of worship.