HCPT Blog 1 - Setting out for Lourdes in Diamond Jubilee year

HCPT groups already in Lourdes spell out 60

The HCPT (Hosanna House & Children's Pilgrimage Trust) has commenced its Diamond Jubilee year of pilgrimages to Lourdes during Easter Week. A regular helper with a West London group is writing a daily blog.

Our Chiswick HCPT Group doesn't set off for Lourdes until the early hours of Easter Monday tomorrow, but some of the nearly 150 groups going this year started arriving on Easter Saturday. Activity has been building up these past few days with the HCPT HQ setting up in Lourdes, Irish bike riders arriving, and a youtube post of the unofficial HCPT anthem 'Rise and Shine' demonstrated by young people from the Salesian College in Farnborough.

With such a youthful pilgrimage - more than 50 percent of participants are under 30 - web feedback and facebook/twitter posts are numerous. Already on the HCPT twitter page we can see Group 40 helpers on a coach on their way to pick up their children, greetings from Clifton Youth, HCPT group members from Merthyr Tydfil and Manchester enjoying the Easter Sunday sunshine outside the Rosary Basilica, and the news that Group 75 landed safe and sound with every single one of their cases! Most of the Irish and Welsh groups arrived on Easter Sunday, with smiling and colourful groups from Cardiff and Belfast airports waving to the cameras. All were met with 'HCPT 60' welcome signs and balloons at Lourdes airport.

Excitement is building in our house too, with four in our family going tomorrow and son James a group leader. Husband Gerry has been going since the 1960s - he was very young when he started! Both of us went 10 years in a row in the 1980s and then, with all three sons newly involved as helpers, my husband and I picked it up again after a two decade gap. So, for 60 years, HCPT has been taking disabled and disadvantaged children to Lourdes and we've been involved in a good many of them, as have a seasoned group of very experienced helpers, group leaders and chaplains. For us, every year it has been an intense and joyful spiritual experience, which completely outweighs the hard work involved.

HCPT founder, Dr Michael Strode, loved Lourdes from his first visit in 1951, especially the Grotto with "its silence and the wonderful opportunity for deep prayer." In 1954, he took a small group of disabled children to Lourdes. "It's a pilgrimage with a serious side, but it is also a holiday; that's what keeps the children fresh - the sing-songs, the outings - and the children can then take a measure of more serious matters." The Trust got going in 1956. The years since then have seen HCPT attract international groups, and the establishment of Hosanna House at the nearby village of Bartres where Bernadette spent time as a young girl. It hosts pilgrimages all the year round.

This year, more than 3,500 are involved in the HCPT Easter pilgrimage, including more than 1,000 children. Each group of between 20 and 30 people has a group leader, chaplain, nurse and helpers. Each wears distinctive clothing so that they stand out in the Lourdes crowds and anyone wandering off can be spotted easily. Our Chiswick group wears bright green. On the HCPT facebook you can see groups - like 46 (Newcastle) and 131 (Leeds) - go through the new Door of Mercy and pay their first visits to the Grotto.

It's sure to be a refreshing week, although we won't feel too lively tomorrow with a 3am start! Those snow-capped hills and fresh Pyrenean air cheer the spirits, but the week is also an inspirational experience of the Kingdom of God. It challenges HCPT pilgrims to Lourdes to carry away from Lourdes an Easter message for the world: a message of new life, love, hope and joy. We are looking forward to joining in tomorrow.

For more information visit: www.facebook.com/HCPTpage/
Twitter @HCPT

The celebration Trust Mass on Thursday 31 March will be streamed live on the internet at 9am see: http://en.lourdes-france.org/