I am the Immaculate Conception

When the Virgin Mary said to St Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes (France) in 1858: "I am the Immaculate Conception," she confirmed the dogma proclaimed by Pius IX in 1854 following the apparitions of the Virgin Mary to St Catherine Labouré, in 1830, in Paris, in the chapel of the Daughters of Charity at the Rue du Bac.

The pope affirmed in his bull Ineffabilis Deus: "We declare and define the doctrine that the Blessed Virgin Mary was, in the first moment of her conception, by a grace and a singular favor of Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved intact from all defilement of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God, and that therefore it must be firmly believed by all the faithful."

From the first centuries, the eastern churches celebrated the original purity of Mary, in a celebration of "the Conception of the Holy Mother of God," especially in Greece, in the middle of the eighth century. Then pilgrims returning from the Holy Land introduced this feast in the West. The English Franciscan Duns Scotus (d. 1308) defined the Immaculate Conception as: "Mary was preserved from the original sin in anticipation of the merits of Christ."

This feast has been celebrated every year on December 8th, the presumed date of the conception of Mary, since 1477, by decision of Pope Sixtus IV. We must not confuse the dogma of the Immaculate Conception with the virgin birth of Jesus.

Some parishes precede the feast with a preparatory novena. Since December 8th is a date included in the Advent season, when it falls on a Sunday the solemnity is moved to the following day, December 9th. Many churches around the world are dedicated to the Immaculate Conception.

In Lyons (France), in 1852, two years before the proclamation of the dogma, the inauguration of the new statue of the Basilica of Our Lady of Fourvière gave birth to a particularly touching popular tradition still observed today: people put small lights outside their windows while a torchlight procession goes up from St John’s Cathedral to the Basilica of Our Lady of Fourvière. 

Adapted from: Aleteia