In Lourdes, all are winners: Heading to the Pyrenees, rolling up sleeves and setting to work with the Order of Malta

It is said that helping out at Lourdes may change your life. Indeed, this line was quoted at a ceremony for “first-timers” by the Grand Master of the Order of Malta, Canadian lawyer Fra’ John Dunlap, inside the hangar-like Église Sainte-Bernadette. This vast modern church was built on the riverside spot where 14-year-old Bernadette Soubirous received her first apparition of Our Lady, on 11 February 1858.

Did my first time helping out at Lourdes change me? In a word, yes. The experience is unique. As Fr Stephen Morrison OPraem, our chaplain, said to the British Order of Malta Association group of around 50 helpers, aged from around 20 to 80: “I expect we all come with prayer intentions asking for Blessed Mary’s miraculous help, whatever our needs and struggles. But we are also something of a miracle, simply by being here.”