The annual Ampleforth Lourdes Pilgrimage is one of the major works of the monastic community and the weekend 23-25 January will see members of the Ampleforth Lourdes Management Committee gather at Ampleforth Abbey to meet up again since the pilgrimage in July last year and to plan the 2026 pilgrimage.
The occasion also provides a welcome opportunity to meet with the monastic community, especially former members of the Ampleforth Lourdes Pilgrimage.
Just over 300 pilgrims attended the 2025 pilgrimage at the Marian shrine in the south of France, including 46 assisted pilgrims and 10 priest chaplains. The theme – Pilgrims of Hope – reflected Pope Francis’ theme for the 2025 Jubilee year.
The pilgrimage theme for 2026 is: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee”, encouraging pilgrims to be guided by the story of the Annunciation. “Our purpose”, the Shrine of Lourdes declares, “is to follow Mary on the threshold of her incredible adventure of faith, at the very beginning of her absolute trust in God’s will”.
The Ampleforth Pilgrimage was founded by Fr Martin Haigh OSB and the then Fr Basil Hume OSB in 1953, to answer Our Lady’s call to give service to those who need extra care in Lourdes. The first pilgrimage was by sea to France and then train from Paris to Lourdes. It proved an eventful journey, because a general strike in France meant the train journey to Lourdes took nineteen hours. At the end of the pilgrimage, six days’ later, the strike had intensified and there were no trains at all. And so it was a lengthy bus ride all the way back and then a boat back to England.
The Ampleforth Journal recorded: “We arrived at Victoria, just twenty-six hours later than we should have done had there been no strike, tired, triumphant and immensely grateful for what we had seen and learnt in Lourdes – and that is not easy to express” – a sentiment still true over 70 years’ later.
If you would like to know more about the Ampleforth Lourdes Pilgrimage, please visit its website: https://www.ampleforthlourdes.org.uk/
