
September 28, 2015
Going to Lourdes as a tourist, not as a devotee, you come across a diverse bunch: the ailing believers looking for a cure, the admirable volunteers taking care of them, the peddlers cashing in on people's faith.
When I went there 45 years ago, I took this shot of pilgrims waiting for a group photograph in front of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, next to the grotto where the Virgin allegedly appeared to Bernadette Soubirous, a 14-year-old peasant girl, in 1858.