A miracle just 500 metres away

 You want to go on a pilgrimage but walking isn’t your strong point and you prefer the tarred streets of the capital to the dirt tracks leading to Santiago de Compostela anyway. Well, don’t move, or at least don’t move too much: leave the hotel, go up rue Vaugirard, turn left into rue Saint Placide, go straight on, cross rue de Sèvres and you’re there. We told you it wasn’t far.

Situated 500 metres at the most from the Hotel Aviatic is La Chapelle Notre Dame de la medaille miraculeuse (Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal), sometimes known as La chapelle de la rue du Bac. The chapel, at 140 rue du Bac, was built on the site where the Blessed Virgin Mary is said to have appeared to Saint Catherine Labouré.

Legend has it that on the night of 19 July 1830 Catherine Lebouré was woken by a small child who said to her "Sister, everyone is sleeping, come to the chapel, the Blessed Virgin is waiting for you". Thinking it a dream, Catherine got up, dressed and followed the child. On arriving at the chapel, Catherine heard the rustling of a silk dress. The Blessed Virgin appeared, radiant, and spoke to her for two hours, telling her that God had a difficult mission for her.

On 27 November 1930, Catherine reported that the Blessed Virgin had come back to her during evening medidation. The Virgin appeared in an oval frame, standing on a globe, wearing rings of different colours, most of which shone rays of light onto the globe. Around the frame appeared the words "O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee". The Virgin said "This is the image of the graces which I give to those who ask", and to explan the rings which did not shine a light, she added "Those are the graces for which people forget to ask". The image then appeared to rotate, showing the back of the medal: a large letter M for Mary, surmounted by a cross. Above this were two hearts: the Sacred Heart of Jesus, crowned with thorns, and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, pierced by a sword, with twelve stars around the image.

Catherine then heard Mary ask her to take these images to her confessor, and to tell him to cast them onto medals as "all who will wear them will receive graces".
The apparitions of the Chapel of the Miraculaous Medal were recognised by the Vatican in 1946, and since then the chapel has been a place of pilgrimage…just a short stroll from the hotel.