A friend once said, "I went to Lourdes a tourist; I came home a pilgrim." This, I believe, is a fair assessment of my own recent experience as one of several priests invited by the Order of Malta to serve as chaplains to its members - and the individuals suffering various ailments whom they accompany each year to Lourdes. In this and the next Light and Life I will offer some thoughts on my recent pilgrimage, together with a brief history of the Order of Malta.

The present-day Order of Malta traces its history to the end of the 11th Century, when Italian merchants sought permission to erect a hospice in Jerusalem, to care for Roman Catholic pilgrims. As time passed, the Order received bequests of castles and territory, with the donors’ specific request that these be used to safeguard Christians - and Christian interests - in areas largely under the authority of rulers hostile to the Christian faith.

By the end of the 12th Century, Muslim leaders had captured one Christian fortress after another. Hospitaller and other Christian forces withdrew to Cyprus, from which they hoped to return quickly to the Holy Land. These dreams went unrealized, and, at the beginning of the 14th Century, the Hospitallers moved their headquarters to Rhodes. From here they offered financial aid, ships and other assistance to the Christian forces trying to withstand Turkish domination of the region. These efforts proved unavailing, and at the beginning of January, 1523, the Hospitallers evacuated Rhodes. Seven years later they were offered the island of Malta as a base from which to protect the Mediterranean and northern Africa from Muslim forces.

Hospittalers were among the Christian forces that defeated the Turkish navy at the Battle of Lepanto, in 1571. Their determination never to fight other Christians rendered them powerless when the revolutionary French navy, under the command of Napoleon, attacked and claimed Malta in 1798. With the dawn of the 19th Century the Order of Malta came to a new - or renewed - understanding of its mission. Gradually abandoning its claim to serve as an armed force, the Order of St. John reclaimed its identity as a formidable charitable institution. The Order is recognized as a sovereign entity, and enjoys diplomatic relations with numerous nations and institutions, including the United Nations. Because the Order owes allegiance to no sovereign except the Pope, its members are often among the first to be admitted into disaster-stricken areas, to offer relief. Most recently, the Order spear-headed relief efforts to those endangered by floods in Burma.

Because Lourdes draws individuals seeking healing from every corner of the world, the Order of Malta’s involvement at Lourdes should come as no surprise. Every year, members of the Order accompany invalids - called malades - to the site of the Blessed Virgin’s apparition to Bernadette Soubirous in 1858. Here the malades are offered the opportunity to wash in the miraculous waters of Lourdes and - more important - the opportunity to renew their faith and re-invigorate their devotion through a series of spiritual exercises spread over several days.

Each group of the Hospitallers sets its own program. The group I accompanied begins its days of prayer with a ceremony of foot-washing, in which those who are ill are served by Order members, which include a number of priests and bishops. This ceremony recalls the liturgy of Holy Thursday, in which the Church’s ministers humble themselves in imitation of Our Savior, who washed the feet of His disciples.

What makes Lourdes impressive is the faith of the individuals who flock there. Only a few of those who make the pilgrimage are healed of a diagnosable illness, but no one who prays at the grotto or washes his hands in the water from its stream is untouched by the palpable devotion of the place. I have been blessed - and often - throughout the years of my religious and priestly life, but I consider myself specially privileged to have carried the petitions of our friends in the Rosary Confraternity to this hallowed ground.

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