Southwark's Pilgrimage to Lourdes

Theme for 2010: With Bernadette we make the Sign of the Cross

Welcome to the web pages dedicated to
Southwark's Diocesan Pilgrimage to Lourdes
20th - 27th August 2010

A message from Deacon Michael Kennedy
Southwark Lourdes Pilgrimage Director

By the time you read these few words, Southwark's pilgrims will have arrived in Lourdes and settled into their hotels. During our week we shall be praying for our diocese and hope that you will join us in prayer. The daily prayer intentions are linked to the menu above.

We, along with all Lourdes pilgrims this year, will focus on the Pilgrimage Theme for 2010: With Bernadette we make the Sign of the Cross. The Sisters at the Convent at Nevers, where Bernadette was a nun, were edified by the reverent and careful way she made the Sign of the Cross - she had, after all, imitated the way in which Our Lady had made it during the first vision at the grotto. Bernadette was once asked by another Sister: “What should one do to be sure to go to Heaven?” she answered straight away: “To make a proper Sign of the Cross is already a good start”.

So we will learn to appreciate more deeply the value of this Sign, which is the introduction to the Eucharist and many of our prayers, and to give it a greater significance in our lives. It is the Sign which claimed us for Christ at our Baptisms, which we learnt from our earliest days and which reminds us of the embrace of the Holy Trinity and the good news of the salvation which Christ won for us by his Cross and Resurrection. May we learn to appreciate its beauty and to make it with great care and reverence.

I invite you to join us in spirit during this week. Please browse through this Lourdes 2010 section of our site - you may wish, for instance, to meditate on the Stations of the Cross ...

Bishop Paul and I, and the priests, deacons and all Southwark pilgrims remember you in prayer at this Shrine of Our Lady.

With every good wish and blessing,

Friday, 20th August 2010

Links and Resources

The Catholic Association Website

Lourdes Grotto Webcam
on the official site of the Sanctuaries of Our Lady of Lourdes

Lourdes: static Google map with main locations

Lourdes: interactive Google map

A4 Photo of Our Lady of Lourdes

Download in .pdf format

Download in .jpg format

A message from Deacon Michael Kennedy
Southwark Lourdes Pilgrimage Director

I hope that you will be able to be with us in Lourdes this year, but, if this is not possible, you may wish to join us in spirit and pray with us and for us during our time in Lourdes.

Southwark is one of the dioceses and groups that travels with the Catholic Association and together we have been preparing for the 2010 Pilgrimage since we returned from Lourdes last year. I was in Lourdes recently with Monsignor William Saunders, Director of the Catholic Association. We were attending a meeting of Pilgrimage Directors which gave us the opportunity to make final arrangements for this year's visit.

The Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes on 11th February was celebrated during the meeting and after Mass in the underground basilica, with Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, Archbishop of Bordeaux, presiding, we prayed the Angelus at the Grotto where Bishop Jacques Perrier, Bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes, outlined the pastoral theme for 2010 - With Bernadette we make the Sign of the Cross.

So now I warmly invite you to join the Southwark Pilgrimage to Lourdes from 20th - 27th August. If you have any questions or would like further information please contact me personally - I will do my best to help.

With every good wish and blessing,

Mobile: 07521 519482
Email: rcaspilgrim@btinternet.com

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