After a long day of travel due to the intensity of the traffic, the 540 participants in the pilgrimage from the diocese of Chartres reached the Marian city on Saturday, August 21 in the evening.
This Sunday, August 22, in the morning, the sending mass in the church of Sainte-Bernadette in Lourdes brought together 82 patients, 246 hospital workers, 55 young people and their companions, and 105 pilgrims. Monsignor Christory celebrated this first pilgrimage mass with the abbots Cornic, Henri, Roder, Coulon, Besnier, Vital, Boucée, Jean Augustin, and don Louis Marie. Permanent deacons Emmanuel Fau and Didier Gougis as well as Clément Pierson, ordained deacon for the priesthood in early July, were also present.
350 Catholics from the diocese of Chartres left on Saturday morning on an annual pilgrimage to Lourdes
The Bishop of Chartres did not hide his emotion and his joy at seeing so many people this year, especially on the side of the sick and young hospital workers.
He urged his audience to live fully these four days “by disconnecting and going towards the other, towards the other that we do not know”.
Among the hospital staff, Marie-Pierre, 41, has been coming to Lourdes for sixteen years “to put herself at the service of the sick”. But, for ten years, she has been part of the choir, accompanying the songs on the flute. She is “happy to be able to participate in making the celebrations even more beautiful”.
In Eure-et-Loir, the craze for the “pelé” towards Lourdes does not weaken
Among the sick, Jean-Marie, a regular on pilgrimages, had to resolve to accept the status of disabled pilgrim in order to be able to follow “his” pilgrimage again this year, but he hopes “to really come back up next year”. As for Martine, if she agreed to be in a wheelchair, it is to be able to be permanently near François her husband, victim of a stroke.
The afternoon continued with the Eucharistic procession, from the esplanade to the underground basilica of Saint Pius X.
– .
