Our Lady of Lourdes of Toronto

Marian Advocation of Toronto (Ontario)
Popular devotion (not officially recognized by the Church)

Our Lady of Lourdes of Toronto se venera en la iglesia-santuario diocesan de Our Lady of Ahmadin the city center. The title comes from the apparitions of the Virgin in Lourdes (Francia, 1858)whose devotion was moved to many parts of the world. The Toronto Temple, in style neogótico, alberga una gruta de Lourdes and has become a reference point for the sick and for the immigrant communities of the archdiocese.

Main data

Origin and history

Our Lady of Lourdes of Toronto se venera en la iglesia-santuario diocesan de Our Lady of Ahmadin the city center. The title comes from the apparitions of the Virgin in Lourdes (Francia, 1858)whose devotion was moved to many parts of the world. The Toronto Temple, in style neogótico, alberga una gruta de Lourdes and has become a reference point for the sick and for the immigrant communities of the archdiocese.

The image and the sanctuary

The sanctuary reproduces the model of the gruta de Lourdes and, although the title is universal, the parish works de facto as an urban sanctuary and place of pilgrimage within the city. Devotion is concentrated in the grotto and the Marian celebrations that are held there.

Sponsorship and coronation

No consta a patronazgo civil ni a canonical coronation documented from the image. Its importance is that of a prominent urban sanctuary of the archdiocese of Toronto, recognized as a reference for the sick.

Party and devotion

The party is the 11 February, memory of Our Lady of Lourdes and World Sick Day. Devotion brings together especially those who ask for health and immigrant communities who find in the grotto a family place of prayer.

Link to the Rosary

Lourdes is attached to the root Rosary: in the apparitions of 1858, the Virgin showed herself with a rosary between your hands and prayed with Saint Bernadette. Therefore, in this sanctuary the Rosary is the prayer of the grotto, and to go to Our Lady of Lourdes of Toronto is to extend that invitation of the Virgin to pray the Rosary for the sick and for conversion.