Bartres – history

Foundation

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERAFor the foundation, let us go back in time: in 1951, some sisters were sent from the Solitude community in Evry (then Grandbourg par Evry–Petit-Bourg) to Lourdes, where an elderly couple gave the Congregation a house. Of course, Lourdes as a city of Mary greatly attracted us; but a second thing that was attractive for us was the biblical aspect of the message, for the apparitions in all their details hold similarities with the Bible: the wind, the rock, the water, the light…

 

 

la_maison_ de_Lourdes_01Lourdes was the first foundation made by the contemplative sisters of Our Lady of Sion.

 

The community was to live in that house for 36 years. Because the house was situated on one of the roads leading to Lourdes, the noise from the ever more numerous cars obliged the sisters to think about another more silent site.

 

 

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They found land for building in Bartrès, 3 km from Lourdes; it is on a hill outside the village, in the midst of meadows and fields and facing the Pyrenees. The sisters moved there in the spring of 1988.