From its formation in the eleventh century, the Order has assisted pilgrims in search of healing.  For centuries, the Order assisted pilgrims traveling from Europe to the Holy Land.  Since the middle part of the twentieth century, the Order, including its Western Association, has assisted pilgrims travelling to the Grotto in Lourdes, France.

Between February 11 and July 16, 1858, a Lady dressed in white with a blue sash, a Rosary, and yellow roses on her feet appeared eighteen times to Bernadette Soubirous, a 14-year old peasant girl with little formal education.  Each time, the Lady appeared in a grotto adjacent to the River Gave below a state-owned forest in the town of Lourdes, which sits at the foot of the Pyrenees in southern France near the border of Spain.  Each time the Lady appeared to Bernadette, Bernadette was accompanied by others.  The Lady invited Bernadette to pray the Rosary.  She also instructed Bernadette to pray to God for sinners, to dig a hole in the mud at the base of a grotto, which revealed a spring, to drink the water, and to ask the local priests to build a chapel on the site.  On March 25, 1858, Bernadette asked the Lady her name and was told "Que soy era Immaculada Councepio," in English, "I am the Immaculate Conception."  As news of the apparitions spread, large crowds came to the grotto of Lourdes to witness Bernadette's trances.   Miracles were reported as pilgrims bathed in and drank the water from the spring. 

Since 1858 millions of pilgrims have visited Lourdes.   They bring their ills, their sorrows, their struggles.  For over 50 years, the Order of Malta has brought and cared for pilgrims seeking healing at Lourdes.  The Western Association conducts two Lourdes pilgrimages each year, one around May 1, the other during the summer.  Generally between 250 and 300 pilgrims from the Western Association participate each year in the spring pilgrimage.  This usually includes around 50 malades, that is, men, women and children facing significant, and often life-threatening, medical challenges.  Malade candidates who are practicing Catholics may, by invitation, submit a malade application to the Western Association.  For more information about the spring pilgrimage, please contact Jill Ortiz. 

Every summer, the Western Association also participates in a youth pilgrimage to Lourdes.  Members of the Western Association chaperone a couple dozen young adults from the Western United States to assist malades and other pilgrims as they arrive in Lourdes.  Qualified young adults must be between ages 14 and 23.  For more information about the summer youth pilgrimage, please contact Kevin White.