This directory lists all of the volunteer projects and spiritual activities sponsored by the Federal Association.

Several of our Federal Association doctors spend one or two weeks each year working at the hospital. On this Doctors Joe Giere, Richard Perry, William Battle, and Michael Fitzgerald spent the week operating at the hospital as well as teaching the Haitian doctors. Noreen Falcone, Michael Sullivan, Sue and Mo DuFour joined Margaret Fitzgerald and Barbara Murphy for the second half of the week visiting the hospital, clinic and helping out in the nutrition center.

All the visitors / volunteers spent a day traveling on extremely rugged roads to visit other works supported by the Order in the region including a school of 750 grade school students in a remote village. The school provides a nourishing lunch, often rice and beans, made possible by a subsidy from the CRUDEM Foundation. For many this is the only meal of the day. The sisters who run the school say that without the subsidy there would be no school as many parents send their children as much for nourishment as for education.

The poverty is indescribable but the people are amazing. They arrive for doctor appointments in their finest clothes. They carry themselves with great dignity. The students are immaculately dressed in uniforms and exceptionally well disciplined in their classrooms of 30 to 40. After lunch they enjoyed playing with, holding hands and inundating the visitors with affection.

Droves of handicapped and sick pilgrims filed into the pews of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington for Mass, and to receive the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick on Feb. 11, the World Day of the Sick and the 150th anniversary of the Marian apparitions at Lourdes, France.

Click the link above to view the photo gallery of the day’s events.

Droves of handicapped and sick pilgrims filed into the pews of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington for Mass, and to receive the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick on Feb. 11, the World Day of the Sick and the 150th anniversary of the Marian apparitions at Lourdes, France.

“As we begin reflections on the World Day of the Sick … we are very appreciative that we can celebrate … on Feb. 11, the day the Church commemorates Our Lady of Lourdes,” said Washington Archbishop Donald Wuerl, the principal celebrant and homilist for the Mass.

The archbishop thanked the Order of Malta, a lay religious order dedicated to the poor and sick, for helping bring sick pilgrims to the Mass. He also thanked the sick pilgrims for traveling to the Mass, and Friends of Lourdes USA, an organization that helps promote the story of Lourdes to the public.

Many of the pilgrims who came to the basilica for Mass had the same hope that pilgrims who fly across the Atlantic to Lourdes had - they went in search of a cure. Their inspiration to look for healing on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes can be traced to the miraculous water found in the grotto of Massabielle, the place where Our Lady appeared in 1858 to St. Bernadette Soubirous.

Although pilgrims who attended Mass at the basilica did not touch Lourdes water, many still felt God’s presence through the Mass and the Anointing of the Sick.

Hazel Chin, sick with diabetes, said she came to the Mass with the hope of being cured by Our Lady.

“Years ago the sick came to Our Lady of Lourdes … and she would heal them, I truly believe that. I truly believe that when I go to the doctor I will have no problem after today,” she said.

But even if the pilgrims did not receive a physical healing, they would still receive spiritual healing, Archbishop Wuerl said.

“Through the years, Lourdes has been synonymous with physical sickness … but the message of Lourdes goes far beyond physical healing. Our Lady of Lourdes brings about in us a healing of the heart where Jesus most wants to touch us,” he said.

When the archbishop traveled to Lourdes, he remembered seeing a priest who was paralyzed from the shoulders down, and he decided to pray for him. When the archbishop told him he had prayed for him, the priest responded saying he hoped the archbishop prayed for the same thing he prayed for.

“I ask that God would give me the grace to bear the cross that in His love He has fashioned for me,” the disabled priest told the archbishop.

This was a sign of God’s work in the world, the archbishop added.

Citing Pope Benedict XVI’s recent encyclical “Spe Salvi,” on hope, the archbishop said it is important to remember that “sickness is a sign of an even deeper wound that we bear on our humanity.”

“Suffering is part of our human existence, it was never God’s plan that there would be sickness and suffering,” he said, explaining that it was caused by the fall of man.

But now Christ asks people to bring their suffering to Him on the cross, the archbishop added.

“We are invited to enter the mystery of human suffering,” he said.

Noreen Falcone, the first female president of the Order of Malta Federal Association, said seeing the Anointing of the Sick is an “amazing experience.”

“Like Archbishop Wuerl said, there is a healing of the heart, and healing of the spirit,” she said.

Jeff Ludwig, a knight in the Order of Malta, said members in the order helped pilgrims attend the Mass because they give their lives to the poor and sick. Ludwig added that the order looks to Mary as a good example of selflessness.

“She is our mother who has demonstrated selflessness as she gave herself to the Lord. She guides us and nurtures us,” he said. “(She) provides us an example of how we can be humble servants of the Lord.”

Chrissy Diffenderffer, a dame in the Order of Malta, said at the Mass it was inspiring to see the faith and love people had.

“You feel such love when you come here,” she said. “We take up our cross, and we carry it with Jesus.”

Mariah McGrogan is the Auxiliary coordinator for Volunteers for SMOM Youth Project. Mariah is a high school junior who has completed two pilgrimages to Lourdes 2005-2006 and has volunteered at a Nursing Home in Pittsburgh for the past three years. While in Lourdes she saw the need and having met other auxiliary members from other regions she has volunteered to begin the first Pittsburgh Region auxiliary which would be a Malta project specific. Within two weeks from the date of the Lourdes Pilgrimage she has counted five new volunteers who are willing to help. Her goal is to increase this number by June. She will be researching possible projects for the group and identify a location as they are anxious to begin.