A worldwide prayer chain in tribute to Mary

On December 8, 2018, the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, the Lourdes Shrine hosted the fourth "Floral Tribute to the Immaculate," organized by the Family of Our Lady of Lourdes.

Father André Cabes, the shrine’s rector, reminded listeners that the Virgin Mary appeared there with two yellow roses, one on each foot, matching the color of her rosary. By this she taught us that the Rosary, as we join our prayers to hers, makes the world bloom. We are called to become this flowerbed, to form a new paradise for the world.

A "Global Prayer Chain to the Immaculate" took place on the same day, with thousands of people offering prayers to Mary on all continents—individuals, families, parishes, cathedrals, shrines and basilicas.

In 1965, three years before his death, Saint Padre Pio had asked one of his spiritual daughters to bring a flower wreath to the statue of the Immaculate near the Spanish Steps of Rome on December 8th, solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, on his behalf and that of the sick of Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza from San Giovanni Rotondo (Italy).

Fifty years later, in 2015, taking up the request of their holy founder, the Paris Padre Pio Prayer Groups decided to bring a flower wreath to the statue of the Virgin Mary in the grotto of Lourdes, each year on December 8th, at the same place where Our Lady had said to Bernadette, on March 25, 1858: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”

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