Beauraing
Beauraing is a small town in the French-speaking part of
Belgium that in 1932 became the site of one of the important
modern apparitions of the Virgin Mary. The sighting of the
Virgin was made by five children, all students in a Catholic parochial
school. On November 29, 1932, at the end of the school
day, the childenFernande (age 15), Gilberte (13), and Albert
Voisin (11), and Andrée (14), and Gilberte (11)Degeimbre
gathered in front of the convent where the girls attended
classes and prepared to walk home. Albert was the first to see
someone on the railway bridge across from the convent. He
called the attention of the others to the figure in white. Initially
frightened, they hurried home. Their parents dismissed the
story.
The next day at the same time, they again saw the figure. On
the third night, it was in the convent garden near a statue of
Mary as she had appeared at Lourdes. They saw that the figure
was a young beautiful Lady dressed entirely in white with a nimbus
of golden rays. She stood on a cloud that obscured her feet.
Gilberte Degeimbre was overcome with emotion and the children
took her home. Three of the children immediately returned
to the garden. The Lady had changed locations, to the
lower branch of a hawthorn tree. This would be the site of all
of the future apparitions.
The apparitions continued daily through December, the
five children gathering at the spot before the hawthorn tree in
a trance-like state generally referred to as ecstasy. Others
began to observe the children as they watched the Virgin, but
as is common in such events, only the children actually saw her.
As word spread through the community as to what was occurring,
several physicians appeared among the observers, and in
the course of the apparition tested the children. They stuck
them with pins, placed a flame under their hands, directed a
bright light into their eyes. The children reacted to none of
these occurrences, and no sign of the testing appeared on their
body after the apparition was finished.
The messages at Beauraing were brief, and in fact in more
than 30 appearances the Virgin spoke only a couple of times.
She did request that a chapel be built, and on one of her last
appearances she exposed her Immaculate Heart (devotion to
it being a major element in the apparitions at Fatima, Portugal).
The last appearance occurred on January 3, 1933, in part
noteworthy by the failure of one of the children to see her. The
Virgin spoke an individual message to each of the four children
and also gave them a secret. Secret messages had first become
a part of the Virgins apparitions at La Salette in France, but
the secrets of Fatima had become an item for widespread speculation.
After the apparition was seemingly over, the Lady appeared
separately to the fifth child.
The apparitions caused a wide debate within Catholic circles
in Belgium, and many denounced the children as hoaxers.
Their plight was not helped by the appearance of several people
claiming to have seen the Virgin also at the same spot but
embellishing their story with obviously fanciful material. However,
the children stuck to their story and returned each evening
to the spot of the apparitions to pray. In 1935 the local
bishop finally convened a committee to investigate the apparitions.
They worked for nine years, but in the end concluded favorably
and the church approved the apparitions. The approval
came in the midst of World War II (193945) and the Nazi
occupation of the country. After the war, a chapel was erected
and pilgrimages commenced.
Beaumont, John Encyclopedia of Occultism & Parapsychology 5th Ed.
164
The children went on to lead rather ordinary lives. The four
girls married and Albert served in World War II and afterwards
moved to the Congo as a teacher. Today hundreds of thousands
travel to Beauraing to visit the spot in the convent garden
where the children saw the Virgin Mary. The apparitions at
Beauraing are frequently tied to those at Banneux, Belgium,
a nearby town that experienced a set of apparitons just a few
weeks after those at Beauraing stopped.
Sources
Amatora, Sister Mary. The Queens Heart of God The Complete
Story of Our Lady of Beauraing. New York Pageant Press, 1957.
Beevers, John. The Golden Heart The Story of Beauraing, Chicago
Henry Regnery, 1956.
Connor, Edward. Recent Apparitions of Our Lady. Fresno,
Calif. Academy Library Guild, n.d.
Sharkey, Don, and Joseph Debergh. Our Lady of Beauraing.
Garden City, N.Y. Hanover House, 1958.
