Word from the Pastor
Friday, February 3, 2023
Dear Friends of Lourdes,
I am delighted to be writing to you now, a few days before the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes on 11th February, when the Church also celebrates the World Day of the Sick. Firstly, I would like to thank you. Your constant loyalty to the Sanctuary of Lourdes is proof of your great generosity.
It allows us to make the Sanctuary welcoming to the 20,000 pilgrims who will be coming to the Grotto in the coming days, as Bernadette did, in 1858, during the first of the Apparitions of the Virgin Mary.
Let us remember the request that the Virgin Mary made to Bernadette: “A chapel should be built here”. This was the message given during the thirteenth apparition. The lady, who revealed herself in Lourdes to be the Immaculate Conception, gave the mission to build “here” the Sanctuary that we know today.
She asked for a chapel to be built so that the Grotto could become a sanctuary, a place of pilgrimage where people could pray and celebrate the sacrament of the Covenant, the Eucharist, and the sacraments of Mercy. If we re-examine this request, we can see that, in Lourdes, the plan was already all mapped out. Dear Friends of Lourdes, it is not only stonemasons who build. From your own home, you are still participating in this construction today. It is continuous and real.
I also invite you to allow yourself to be built up internally and spiritually as a disciple of Christ Jesus, on the way to salvation. It is by allowing ourselves to be led that we become builders of the true chapel that is the Church. With all the sick, vulnerable or disabled people that the Hospitallers accompany on pilgrimages, let us build the chapel.
With a missionary spirit, let us build the Church. May the Virgin Mary intercede for all of you and fill you with her grace, as she did so generously to little Bernadette.