Anecdotes about the Virgin Mary

"The Miraculous Medal of Rue du Bac"

Paris (France) (1830)

In 1830, a young Daughter of Charity named Catherine Labouré claimed to have received several apparitions of the Virgin Mary in the chapel on Rue du Bac in Paris. The most famous occurred on the night of November 27: she saw the Virgin standing on a globe, with rays of light emanating from her open hands toward the earth.

Around the image appeared written an invocation that would be engraved on millions of medals and in the hearts of the faithful.

According to the story, the Lady asked him to have a medal struck with that image, promising abundant graces to those who wore it with faith. The medal was produced based on this testimony and spread with astonishing speed throughout Paris, especially during the years of the cholera epidemic, when people began to call it "miraculous" because of the conversions and favors attributed to it.

Catherine lived the rest of her life in humility and silence, not revealing until shortly before her death that she had been the visionary. The small medal, born from her hidden testimony, remains one of the most widespread Marian sacramentals in the world.