One of the things I like about Lourdes is the sense I get there of the worldwide Catholic family – the different languages praising the one God, the different ways of praying, the colour of skin and dress …

This morning, the Kilmore branch of this worldwide family comes together to pay attention to one precious strand in our Catholic inheritance – our care and prayer for the sick.

We came here last Thursday carrying, not just our own worries, our own sickness but, also, the burdens and worries of all those who have asked us to remember them.  So, at this moment, we try to really remember all those who have asked us to keep them in our prayers.

From my own parish I remember …

Sickness and suffering is an unavoidable piece of luggage on life’s journey.  It is as much part of the journey as the passport and the ticket on the journey home tomorrow.  When we see, what at times seems like, a tidal wave of wheelchairs that we encounter here, we see that illness knows no age barriers, no language barriers: it affects all colours of skin, it affects male and female.  It takes many forms, it may mean ‘ordinary’ illness; it may mean coping with a wheelchair; it may mean depression; it may be a crippling anxiety about debt or threatened unemployment; it may mean the lingering pain of bereavement or separation. 

Yet crosses come in many forms.

But we do not carry it alone.  He came to walk in our shoes; he came to carry our infirmities; to experience our weakness; to know the same sorrows that beset us all. 

Those who have been here more than once know that this place, where there are so many sick, is not a place of sorrow.  It is not a place where you hear people grumble or feel sorry for themselves.  It is a place of much good humour and a place where people have the strength to say thanks.

For some, it will be thanks for the gift of health.  For others it will be thanks for the care and attention they receive.  We are thankful for the help and relief that is available in out time to heal broken bodies and to give life a new lease – that was not available in other times.

We are grateful for our doctors, nurses and carers; grateful too for the skills of scientists, biologists and chemists, who try to extract, from God’s good earth, healing remedies for those diseases that cause us most distress today.

And so, with all this luggage we come into the presence of the healing person of Jesus.  We are part of that large crowd that once surrounded Him in the hills.  Into His presence we bring all our sick, those here, and those remembered, and we repeat to Him the Gospel word – “the person you love is ill”.  We surround our sick with our heartfelt prayer – each prayer that is not just ours, but which is the prayer of the whole Church.

For the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, is a prayer of the whole Church, prayer that is rooted in the healing power of Jesus.

At its heart is the oil of the sick and, its gentle texture on the forehead and hand, is a sign of the healing Lord, sitting on the hills, overlooking the Sea of Galilee, touching the leper, the paralytic …

We make our own, the prayers of the Sacrament and with united voices and hearts, we surround our sick with them. 

Let our united faith and prayer come to bear on all who live in the shadow of the cross.  To all we say, courage, take heart, do not be afraid, live each moment of life as a wondrous gift of God.

May our Lady, comforter of the afflicted, healer of the sick, be with us as we celebrate the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, with you all and with St. Bernadette, make the sign of the cross on the forehead and hand.

Fr John Murphy PP, Bailieborough, Co. Cavan