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A:Bernadette Soubirous, a 14-year-old peasant girl, told her mother that she had seen a 'lady' in the cave of Massabielle, about a mile from Lourdes, while she was gathering firewood with her sister and a friend. Similar appearances of the mysterious lady were reported on seventeen further occasions that year, and many Christians believe the sightings to have been of Mary mother of Jesus. Pope Pius IX authorised the local bishop to permit the veneration of the Virgin Mary in Lourdes in 1862.

Lourdes is now a site for Catholic pilgrimage, receiving over 80,000 pilgrims a year. It renowned for its cures and approximately 7000 people have sought to have cures confirmed as miracles, but only 68 of these have been declared as scientifically inexplicable by both the Lourdes Medical Bureau and the Catholic Church. This number is so small as to suggest that these cases were likely to have been cured or gone into remission anyway, without any divine help.

That such a tiny proportion of those seeking cure were cured or went into remission could show that God is not the agent for these cures. It could show that God is unable to help the ill and infirm, no matter how fervent their prayers and sincere their pilgrimages. It could also show that he chooses not to help Christians over atheists and members of other faiths.

Interestingly, the truth of the apparitions of Lourdes is not an article of faith for Catholics. But if the Church is not convinced about the truth of the apparitions, then the cures can not even be called miracles, because they were not the result of divine intervention. God probably has no involvement at all.

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