The train from Lourdes to Paris brought us to the station at 3:33 p.m., and we left the hotel for the airport at 7:00 a.m. That gave us only time for a quick bus ride around Paris, Mass and a farewell dinner. All we saw of the Eiffel Tower was from a bus window, if you were lucky enough to be seated on the tower side of the bus. That was a tease, or maybe it was a venial sin!
The statue in the main square of the shrine of Lourdes stands proud, no, it stands humbly. We proudly behold our Mother, as we have been instructed by Jesus as he hung on the cross, “Behold your mother!”
Malades is the French word for the sick. They are the reason for procession at Lourdes and the reason for pilgrimage to Lourdes. If I am blessed to go to Lourdes again, I must visit the hospital at the shrine, where all the sick are given care during their pilgrimage to Lourdes. There would be great grace in that.
Can enough photos ever be enough? This is another of my favorites.
At Fatima, Lourdes and the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, my seminary days of chant paid off. At each place, when the “Salve Regina” was chanted, I could sing with gusto. It felt so good and so right!
Following the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes and the sick are the rest of us, raising our candles high at the singing of the “Glory be to the Father,” and for the frequent and moving singing of “Ave, ave, ave Maris,” each time getting louder and louder, it seems, as the procession moves on. Verses of the Lourdes hymn are sung in different languages, as people of all languages join in the common Latin, “Ave.” Want to hear it, go my YouTube channel’ MilfordAndrewPastor.”
First in the procession at Lourdes are the malades: the sick. We bring our own dis-ease, of course, but the main reason for the prayer and the procession is for the sick. In the rosary we pray for “all those tormented by life.”
In the evening candlelight procession, immediately following the crucifix flanked by lighted candles is the statue of “Our Lady of Lourdes.”
While filling the plastic jug with Lourdes water, it is easy to question the assurance of the shopkeeper that, of course, it will be just fine stories in your checked baggage.
With Open Doors 