Hundreds of people have visited the relics of St Bernadette following its arrival in Belfast as part of a pilgrimage across the island of Ireland.
Large queues snaked around St Mary’s Church on Chapel Lane on Tuesday with the first people gathering from around 9.30am.
Members of the public were welcomed into the church at around midday with many visitors describing how they wanted to be a part of the “once in a lifetime event”.
The sacred relics of Bernadette, who became a saint in 1933, arrived in Ireland on September 4 and are now touring all 26 dioceses until November 5.
Saint Bernadette was the visionary who witnessed the Blessed Mother in Lourdes.
Our Lady is said to have appeared 18 times to the young girl, named Bernadette Soubirous, in Lourdes, France, in 1858.
Born at foothills of the Pyrenees Mountains in 1844, Bernadette died in 1879 and was canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1933.
Bernadette’s body was exhumed on April 18 1925 for her beatification and was found to be uncorrupted.
It was then decided to place it in the chapel of the Sisters of Nevers where it is still visible today.
Earlier on Tuesday, the relics were brought to a grotto dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes in Co Antrim.
Hundreds of people gathered at Our Lady of Lourdes National Grotto at Moneyglass, near Toome, to venerate the precious relics.
Once a site of pilgrimage for the faithful from across Ireland, work on the grotto began one year after the adjacent Our Lady of Lourdes Church was completed in 1925.
The landmark site was completed in 1930.
The spectacular monument includes a portion of rock from the site where the Virgin Mary is said to have stood during the apparition to St Bernadette at Lourdes in 1858.
Three stain glassed windows in the grotto also depict the three instructions given to St Bernadette.
The one-off visit was organised by local people including Siobhan McErlean and Úna Johnston, while Stephen McCoy, who survived the 1989 Kegworth air disaster, was in attendance.
Ms Johnston said around 500 people present were left “spiritually high and as happy as can be”.
She said it was an important occasion for the people of Moneyglass given the “significance” of the grotto and effort made around 100 years ago to build it.
