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  RETURN TO FRANCE TOP 10 Return to Travel Tips:     1. FLEXI IS OUR NEW WAY! Reserve-FLEXI, Preserve-FLEXI, Regarde-FLEXI, Accepte-FLEXI, Disponible-FLEXI, and EMBRACE YOUR FLEXIBILITY! Flexibility is the newest virtue and can help us toward holiness! Bernadette...

RETURN TO FRANCE   Prayer Petitions Delivered to the Grotto     “Je n’oublierai person.” (I will not forget anyone.) —Ste. Bernadette Soubirous     In Nevers, when asked to pray for so many people, Bernadette replied that she would forget no one—and she surely keeps...

RETURN TO FRANCE TOP 10 NOTABLES:1. Everyone is HAPPY for us to return to travel and to France! Lots of smiles behind all of those masks! 2. Fare increases! Tickets can be more expensive. Buy early! Changes without fee, so far… full flights! 3. Paperwork is required!...

Marlene Watkins, President and Foundress of Lourdes Volunteers, was named by Our Sunday Visitor as one of their 2015 Catholics of the Year. For her founding and continued leadership of Lourdes Volunteers, which serves the sick in Lourdes, brings the sick to Lourdes,...

The latest edition of our newsletter, Lourdes Letter, is now available!  Take a look to keep up with the work we've been doing and the blessings that abound as we continue, with your help, to live our mission to extend the invitation of the Immaculate Conception as...

The 2016 Volunteer and Medical Professional Conference will be held March 4-6 in Miami, Florida!  Together, we'll explore the unique ways in which we discover God's mercy in caring for the sick and disabled in Lourdes, learning invaluable insights from experienced...

On Monday, November 16, all those present in Lourdes - pilgrims, volunteers, chaplains and the Sanctuary staff - united in the Grotto in a moment of silent prayer for peace. We ask today for you to join us and our friends in Lourdes by continuing to pray for peace and...

Accurate measurement can be the final difference between profit and loss to small businesses. For the Soubirous family in 19th century, drought-stricken southern France, weights and measures must have been a defining factor in the loss of their small mill. Measurement...

A Heavenly Request and Promise On Thursday, February 18, 1858, the day after Ash Wednesday, Our Lady spoke to Bernadette for the first time. She requested to meet for fifteen days and made a promise of happiness--not of this world, but of the other world. With the...

 Joyous Feast Day of Our Lady of Lourdes &the World Day of the Sick ~ February 11, 2015 We invite you to pray with us to Our Lady of Lourdes on her Feast Day! Ever immaculate Virgin, Mother of mercy, health of the sick, refuge of sinners, comfort of the afflicted,...

US Military, Minneapolis-St. Paul and Dallas Archdioceses, Albany  and Santa Rosa Diocese. Today, we “walked” in Bernadette’s’ shoes.  We visited the mill where she was born.  We learned about her family being very, very poor—not like middle class—poor and being...

“What an awesome day!”   We started with the International Mass in the Basilica of St. Pius X Underground Basilica.  It was built in 1958 at the  100th anniversary at Lourdes and is shaped like Noah’s Ark.  It’s cool that 25,000 people can fit in this Church. Many of...

On January 7, 1844, in the little town of Lourdes, the first child of Francois and Louise Soubirous was born. She was named in honor of her aunt and was affectionately called Bernadette. In 1858, the Mother of God appeared to little Bernadette 18 times in the Grotto...

In the middle of the power of Washington D.C. is the stately Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, the largest Catholic Church in North America and one of the ten largest Catholic Churches in the whole world. Where is that Lourdes Grotto in the...

Three men without a GPS don’t ask for directions to find an unknown manger... Is this a Christmas Miracle? There was an illuminated path for them to find their way to honor the Christ Child and there is lighted way for us to keep on the road to kneel before Christ......

“Am I not the fountain of your joy?” The Mother of God to Juan Diego. In 1531 the Mother of God appeared to St. Juan Diego at Tepeyac Hill. “I am the Virgin Mary, Mother of the one true God, of Him who gives life.  He is Lord and Creator of heaven and of earth.  I...

How good of a mother would the Most Holy Blessed Trinity create to be the Mother of God? How pure? How perfect? How much grace? Compared to all other women? Like night and day? Mary was conceived without sin the pure vessel to bring forth the Christ. Would any woman...

The tragedy begins—the door to Eternal Happiness is slammed shut by Adam and Eve. Trillions of days and trillions upon trillions of suffering times later, God so loves us that He is sending His Son to open the door for us...  Are we ready for this arrival?  The Advent...

French Grace Before Meals:  Bless us Lord, bless this meal, those who prepared it and give bread to those who have none.  Amen.  The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, our Catholic Faith, the Priesthood, saints, that every-thing is grace,  pure love, incense, the Sacrament...

The western world was so consumed by materialism that God chose a little poor man to make a big change. “Can’t you see My Church is falling into ruin?” God asked Francis of Assisi.   So the unlikely unknown man got some mortar and started to repair the little...

Nestled between the splendor of Napa Valley and Sonoma County are the fruitful vines which harvest into award-winning California wines. Nurtured by generations of passionate winemakers, these vineyards have prospered over the years under expert and attentive care....

Just think, some guy stayed up one night and invented the hula hoop—now he’s a millionaire!” My sister used to say that when we were younger. She was hoping for that night when we would be smart enough to invent something to wake up rich!   We drove to the coast...

The grade school children of St. Anne’s in San Francisco made posters to tape on the pews to honor the Communion of Saints this November. Patron of Artillery, and holy military example of the virtue of courage, St. George, was among the saints depicted, as was St....

In the yoga studio changing room, after early class, Debbie told Cora she was too afraid of dying to fly anywhere, let alone as far as Lourdes. She couldn’t understand why her practical classmate seemed unworried to fly so far away from California to France—just to...

We couldn’t figure out how to buy a train ticket from the machine. The earliest train departed. Better to pay the conductor 3.70 Euro on board than to miss another train. The transfer at the Frankfurt Station was now going to be nearly impossible with only 90 seconds...

Our very first Lourdes Volunteer had just been moved to Germany and I was excited to be reunited at an MCCW-E conference which is how we had originally met in 2002. Then she couldn’t attend the retreat. So close—a little heart’s desire lost. A grace of Lourdes...

The day after we returned home from Lourdes we flew to Frankfurt with tickets gifted to us enabling the Message of Lourdes to be shared with military women and wives at the Military Council of Catholic Women – Europe (MCCW-E) Conference. We traveled northwest by train...

We arrive excitedly tired to a joyful welcome by our faithful volunteers. We come from different places in our lives and differing locales across the United States. We are each drawn in a mysterious way, like Bernadette, through grace, to this very holy place. At...