Bulacan

The Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Bulacan with Healing Spring Water

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GROTTO OF OUR LADY OF LOURDES

Photo from: mattscradle.com

There is more to the sprawling Lourdes Shrine Complex in Barangay Graceville, San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan than the Grotto of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a popular Holy Week destination for Catholic devotees.

A small spring lures the faithful who believe that water from it heals illnesses and grants the petitions of those who drink it.

Photo from: bulacan.gov.ph

Long queues of people holding empty bottles and plastic containers wait patiently for their turn to draw water from the spring, which runs beneath the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes.

The privately owned complex was inaugurated on February 11, 1965. Anita Guidote-Guanzon decided to build the Grotto as an act of thanksgiving after she was cured of cancer upon her return from a pilgrimage to Lourdes, France, in 1961.

Photo from: localyte.com

Lourdes is a pilgrimage town located in southwestern France, at the foot of the Pyrenees, and came to world prominence after Bernadette Soubirous’ numerous visions of the Virgin Mary at the Masabielle Grotto in 1858.

A replica of the basilica in Lourdes, the Grotto also features a Calvary Hill with life-size statues that depict the 14 Stations of the Cross, and a Rosary Hill with 155 giant concrete beads.

Photo from: geotayo.com

The complex’s six hectares came from the 20-ha property that her mother had bequeathed to them. She allotted one hectare for a school and gave away another hectare to the local government “para makapagpatayo ng children’s hospital.” (to build a children’s hospital)

On the slope closest to the entrance of Villa Lourdes, the family’s ancestral home, stand the medical clinic and orphanage set up by the Guanzon couple. Behind the main church and down a curving pathway is the Grotto itself, resembling a cave opening, with the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes gazing out at an amphitheater. The tombs of Anita Guidote-Guanzon and her husband Horacio Alvendia Guanzon lie on the left side of the cave. Crutches hang on a rocky formation, discarded by cured cripples, according to locals.

Photo from: divinajoy.com

The 76-year-old Guidote-Guanzon explained how the “miracle spring” came to be. “My mother was in the farm, trying to regain her health, prior to her pilgrimage to Lourdes, when her caretaker, Macario Yumol, informed her of the spring, With him leading the way and with two other helpers supporting her as she walked, they went to the spring. She was pleasantly surprised to see clear and cool water coming out of the earth.”

Photo from: panoramio.com

Her mother had brought home four big plastic bottles of water from Lourdes, three of which she poured into the shrine’s spring. When the daughter found out about it, she tried to save what was left in the fourth bottle. “Ang liquid na nakalagay sa plastic ay nag-e-evaporate pala. So ang ginawa ko, whatever is natitira, nilagay ko na sa bote at nilagay ko sa refrigerator sa kuwarto ko sa bahay sa Maynila, para lang may maipakita sa next generation,” she said.

Today, faucets dispense the water from the spring. “I had it done so para hindi ma-contaminate ‘yung tubig,” Guidote-Guanzon said.

Photo from: jaydarryl.multiply.com

“There’s a long line of people waiting to draw water every Maundy Thursday and Good Friday,” described Vidal Salise, who has been volunteering to fetch the water to be dispensed to the faucets for four years now.

Some devotees drink the water; others bathe with it. Still others apply it like a balm to heal wounds, injuries and other ailments.

Guidote-Guanzon, herself believes the spring water is miraculous after she recovered on August 8, 1966 from dengue.

Source: mb.com.ph