Marian apparitions: A multidisciplinary approach. The case of Ile Bouchard

Purpose

Discussing Marian apparitions in the light of current knowledge in neuroscience is a challenge: the testimonies are often old and indirect, and the “visionaries” could not be questioned or even examined according to current neurological or psychiatric standards.

Methods

In doing so, we are not unaware of the heterogeneity of seers and the facts they reported: there is not necessarily a single hypothesis. In 1947, four young children reported that they had seen the Virgin in the St Gilles Church in the Loire Valley in France, on Ile Bouchard. These appearances will be discussed here in the light of current knowledge in both neuropsychiatry and sociology.

Findings

Our interpretation calls on two non-exclusive “mechanisms”: on the one hand, mental imagery, which we know can be unconscious and is modulated or generated by frontal “top-down” mechanisms; on the other hand, the sociological consideration of events, using the concept of enchantment.

Conclusion

It is quite possible that Jacqueline, the leader of the group, impregnated by the dogma of the Immaculate Conception and the apparitions in Lourdes, was duped and a victim: she was not aware of the work of her mind, nor of the particular framework in which this experience took place. Her mind was both active because it produced the phenomenon but also passive because she was not aware of her cooperation in its production.