"I wish to manifest my spiritual closeness and my affection to our sick brothers and sisters, through a particular memory for those who are struck by the most serious and painful diseases". Those words were spoken by Benedict XVI yesterday morning, before he introduced the Angelus recitation, during the World Day of the Sick, established by John Paul II fifteen years ago, in the anniversary of the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, "for the link existing between Lourdes and human suffering". On recalling how the Church celebrates the first apparition of the Virgin Mary to Saint Bernadette on February 11th, happened in 1858 in the Grotto of Massabielle, near Lourdes, the Pope pointed out that it was "a prodigious event making that place, situated on the French side of the Pyrenees, a worldwide centre of pilgrimage and intense Marian spirituality". That sanctuary, he added, has become the "destination of numerous ill pilgrims, who start listening to the Holy Mary and are encouraged to accept their pains and offer them for the salvation of the world, linking them with the ones suffered by crucified Christ". This year, the heart of the Day of the Sick "is in the city of Seoul, the capital of South Korea, where I sent Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragán, president of the Pontifical Council for Health Pastoral Care, to represent me". (To be followed)
