Photographing the miracle: Lourdes at the turn of the 20th century

In the years 1890-1910, Lourdes became the place where apologetics were built. Their goal was to bring out the authenticity of supernatural experience and its value as a phenomenon to the public and the medical profession. The objective was to get science to take on the miracle, in order to convince the scientific field to give way to a supernatural hypothesis in the theory of the world. This fight was conducted on several fronts, since it also aimed to evacuate the type of neuro-psychological or occultist forces that were claimed to operate in Lourdes. Photographs, abundantly used from 1900, did not aim to make the miracle visible, but to make believe in the authenticity of Lourdes, showing places and healed individuals through the triteness of portraits cards and tourist photographs, in a perspective that was both scientistic and popular: the picture had to show an accessible reality, one only had to see in order to believe. Adapted from the source document.