Doctors done with Lourdes ‘miracles’

Paris —- An international doctors’ panel appointed by the Roman Catholic Church says it’s getting out of the “miracle” business at Lourdes.

The panel will no longer judge whether pilgrims to the French shrine could have benefited from “miracle” healing —- a huge shift from the centuries-old way of deciding what makes the cut as a divine cure.

“It seems ‘miracle’ may not be the right word to use anymore,” Bishop Jacques Perrier of the Diocese of Tarbes and Lourdes said Wednesday. “It’s no longer a black-and-white question.”

The shrine in the foothills of the Pyrenees mountains in southwestern France draws 6 million pilgrims a year, many of whom believe its spring water can heal and even work miracles. Pope Benedict XVI traveled there in September to celebrate the 150th anniversary of apparitions of the Virgin Mary to 14-year-old Bernadette Soubirous.

Over the years, more than 7,000 pilgrims have claimed to have been healed after bathing in or drinking Lourdes water. The church has officially deemed 67 cures “miraculous.”

In 1954, the Tarbes-Lourdes diocese created the panel of doctors today known as the International Medical Committee of Lourdes, which one doctor said for years all but decided whether healings were miracles.

But last weekend, the panel, known by its French initials CMIL, decided from now on it will only rule on whether healing cases were “remarkable,” leaving it to the church to decide whether they are miracles, the panel’s secretary, Dr. Patrick Theillier, said.

“It’s a sort of rebellion, if you will, against laws that don’t concern us —- and shouldn’t,” he said. “The medical corps must be independent of the ecclesiastic power.”

“Before, what we presented to the church was a gift all wrapped up —- and all the church had to say was ‘I approve,’ without making a lot of effort,” said Theillier, referring judging would-be miracles. “Not today.”