FOUR DAYS TO THE CENTENARY

FROM all over the world—from small English towns to capital cities overseas — news continues to arrive of preparations to celebrate the Lourdes Centenary Year.
In this country many Cathedrals will have solemn High Mass on Tuesday to open the celebrations. At Westminster, the Archbishop will sing Mass in the morning and preside at a Lourdes procession in the evening.
In Liverpool, Archbishop Heenan will preside and preach at High Mass at the church of Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Bernard. Archbishop Grimshaw of Birmingham will pontificate at evening Mass In his Cathedral.
Bishop Parker of Northampton will bless the new church of Our Lady of Peace, Burnham, and sing Mass there at 6.30 p.m. Bishop Wall of Brentwood will preside at High Mass in the church of Our /-' ad)'of Lourdes, Wan stead.
Bishop Flynn will preside at morning High Mass in the Thanksgiving Church at Blackpool.
TELEVISION
THE A.B.C. Television network Iwhich serves an area extending from the South Midlands to the Scottish Border, is giving, its programme in the 'laving Your Life" series to a discussion of the real meaning of Lourdes to this midtwentieth century, on Sunday, February 16.
The Lourdes story will be told by Mgr. Derek Warlock, Secretary to Arehbishop Godfrey of Westminster. A Catholic doctor who is himself paralysed, and who serves on the bureau which investigates the Lourdes cures, will discuss its medical aspects, and a business man who regularly goes on pilgrimage will tell what it means to him. "The idea behind the programme," Mr. Tom Singleton, us producer, told '1HE CATHOLIC HLRALD, "is to make non-Catholics see that a visit to Lourdes is not just a day out but a pilgrimage. The spirit of Lourdes and its spiritual message will feature far larger than the physical cures as such."
A number of photographs of Lourdes will be used during the programme which is from 7 to 7.25 p.m.
, CORONATION 0N Tuesday. the opening day of the Centenary, Cardinal Micara will place a crown on the head of the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes
— Rome's earliest Lourdes statue — which stands in the church of Santa Maria in Aquire. It is to this church that Roman pilgrims who cannot travel to Lourdes will go during the Centenary Year.
In the Philippines, a procession of penance for outrages against Our Lady, will be held every Saturday morning of the Centenary Year at Cebu City. In a Pastoral letter Archbishop Rosales asks that the Mass of Our Lady be celebrated each Saturday during the year.
STAMPS
ALTHOUGH it seems that " France will not be having any special stamps for the Centenary Year, Vatican City is issuing a set of six on Tuesday. They will show three scenes: St. Bernadette beholding the Blessed Virgin, a sick person praying at the Lourdes Grotto, and the Blessed Virgin appearing as the Immaculate Conception.
Cardinal McGuigan, Cardinal Leger, and other members of the Canadian Hierarchy have urged Catholics to go to Lourdes if possible, and also attend celebrations in Quebec in honour of the tercentenary of the founding of the shrine of St. Anne de Beaupre.
AUDIENCES A MESSAGE from Vatican City " this week to pilgrims travelling through Rome to or from Lourdes and wishing to have an audience with the Holy Father, asks that they arrange the visit to coincide with the usual general audience on Wednesdays. Because of the exceptionally large number of deputations, congresses, and so on, this year, special audiences cannot be arranged for pilgrim groups.
EVENING MASSES • Ft' EVENING MASSES • Ft' BISHOP BECK of Salford has BISHOP BECK of Salford has
given permission for evening Mass to be said in all churches of the Salford diocese on Tuesday, opening day of the Centenary Year.
AU the 5,000 parishioners of St. Peter's, Wythenshawe, Manchester. have been asked to place an illuminated statue of Our Lady in their front window on February 11. feast of Our lady of tourdes, and fifth anniversary of the opening date of their £25,000 church.
St. Dominic's Priory. Haverstock Hill, London, is preparing for the Year with a Novena of special sermons by well-known preachers, taking place each evening this week.
FILM COMMENDED
TWENTIETH Century Fox films. who are re-issuing the film of Franz Werfel's " Song' of Bermdette," have received a message from Archbishop Godfrey commending the film
■ aubscribed towards a shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes in Carrara marble which was blessed this week outside the church of St. Ignatius, South "I ottenhatu, North London.
BRIGHTON
BR1GHTON is to have its own Lourdes Festival. There is a special reason for this in that the Convent of Lourdes at Withdean, belongs to the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity and Christian instruction of Nevers.
They were nuns of this Congregation who taught Bernadette in Lourdes and the same Oteler that she was LO join some years after the Apparitions.
With the exchange from time to time of members of the Community between Nevers and Brighton, there were consequently many nuns at Brighton who knew Bernadette well. One of these was Mother Mary Teresa who died three years ago at the age of 98.
On Tuesday, Patronal Feast of the Lourdes Convent, High Mass will be celebrated at St. Mary's, Preston Park. On July 16 and for several days afterwards the Convent will produce an open air pageant written by Alan Rye.