In 2002 I was able to visit Lourdes with a group of Maltese
pilgrims. I celebrated Mass for them and visited many landmarks, both in
Lourdes itself and in the outskirts. But the thing that impressed me the most
is the holiness and sacredness of the entire place. Yes, there were of course
hotels and restaurants, but every shop and souvenir stand sold only religious
articles, and absolutely nothing else. And once you enter the territory of
Lourdes, you feel like you really entered a sanctuary, and you have the feeling
that you were in a church, even with thousands of other pilgrims around. It was
a very special time for me and one really felt the presence of the Blessed
Mother with you wherever you went. Of course we participated in the aux
flambeaux procession in the evening and I even led a decade of the Rosary.
Today we commemorate the first apparition of Our Lady at Lourdes to the young
girl Bernadette Soubirous in 1854. It took the church a few years to declare
the apparitions as truly authentic, and since then over 70 miracles have taken
place to people visiting Lourdes, the tiny place nestled between Spain and
France at the base of the Pyrenees Mountains.
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