To the sick
and health-care workers on their Jubilee
MARY GUIDES AND LIGHTS OUR WAY
11 February 2000
On Friday evening, 11 February, the feast of
Our Lady of Lourdes and the Jubilee of the Sick and Health-Care Workers, the Pontifical
Council for Pastoral Assistance to Health-Care Workers organized a torchlight
procession. More than 60,000 sick people, together with nurses, doctors and
volunteer workers, accompanied a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes from Castel Sant'Angelo down Via della Conciliazione
to St Peter's Square, where they attended a prayer service followed by a sound and light
show. On their arrival in St Peter's Square they were greeted by the Holy Father in Italian. Here is a translation
of his remarks.
This impressive torchlight procession, which
set out from Castel Sant'Angelo
and moved down Via della Conciliazione,
closes this day entirely dedicated to Our Lady. The evocative sight offered by
the long parade of torches calls to mind the procession being held at more or
less the same time in Lourdes, Mary's citadel, where so many
pilgrims, healthy or sick, have an intense and consoling spiritual experience.
Mary guides and lights our way, dear brothers and sisters, whom I greet with
great affection. Mary, our most tender Mother, accompanies us in joy and in
sorrow, in good times and in those of physical and spiritual trial, in order to
help us in every circumstance to say our “yes” to God's will.
This morning in St Peter's Square, we celebrated the Jubilee of the
Sick and Health-Care Workers. This evening we have returned to ask Mary,
“Health of the Sick”, to make the Holy Year a true “year of grace”. May the
Immaculate Virgin help everyone to experience, “through sincere conversion of
heart, the abundance of God's mercy and the joy of a fuller communion with
their brothers and sisters, the first fruits of endless joy in heaven” (Prayer to Mary, Health of the Sick).
Dear
brothers and sisters, as I entrust you to the protection of the Blessed Virgin,
I give you, your families and all your loved ones a special Blessing, which I
gladly extend to all who are united with us in spirit, especially those at the
Grotto of Lourdes and at other Marian shrines.