BRITAIN: Plymouth Cathedral of St Mary and St Boniface will welcome the relic of St Bernadette in a historic visit. The reception is held as part of a pilgrimage tour of the UK in September and October. Cathedral administrator, Canon Mark O'Keefe describes it as a ''once-in-a-lifetime event''.

As a Saint, Bernadette relics have travelled beyond the borders of France to countries such as the United States, and now for the very first time, a relic of St Bernadette will tour England, Scotland, and Wales this September and October.

The journey will begin from the Upper Basilica in Lourdes, stopping at every Catholic Cathedral in Great Britain.

For the diocese of Plymouth in the south-west of England, this visit is a “once in a lifetime event”, and a full programme is in place for the relic’s arrival at the cathedral there on 9 September.

Welcoming the beautiful reliquary will be Plymouth Cathedral Administrator, Canon Mark O’Keeffe, who described the visit as a “red letter day.”

The story of St Bernadette is a remarkable one. A young girl who grew up in a poor family, Bernadette Soubirous received apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary when she was 14 years old.

Between February 11 and July 16, 1858, she witnessed 18 visions at the grotto of Massabielle, near the River Gave in the village of Lourdes.

When St. Bernadette asked the lady who she was on the 25 March 1858, she replied, “I am the Immaculate Conception”- revealing herself to be the Virgin-Mother of God.

Bernadette was beatified in 1925 and canonised by Pope Pius XI on December 8, 1933, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. Since then, her life and legacy has touched millions of lives.

-VN