Angelus News | February 23, 2024 | Vol. 9 No. 4

Third lesson: Accept God’s will. “We
will do the same today, praying for
our brothers and sisters who are sick,
asking for all the miracles for physical
healing, emotional healing, spiritual
healing. … But at the end, we will
always say, ‘Your will be done.’ ”
The bilingual Mass — put on every
year by the Order of Malta — featured
an anointing of the sick and blessings
for caregivers. Each guest also received
a small bottle of water from Lourdes,
along with prayer petition cards that
will be taken in May to the Our Lady
of Lourdes grotto in France.
Lourdes is such a powerful place
that Order of Malta organizers said
they chose it as the theme for this
year’s Mass: “A Spiritual Journey to
Lourdes.” As part of the event, they
also featured photographs of Lourdes
at the cathedral, along with people
who have gone on the pilgrimage to
France to speak about their experiences.
For this year’s Mass, the Order of
Malta also had a 4-foot statue made
of Our Lady of Lourdes — carried
on a platform bedecked with yellow
roses — that they used in the opening
procession, similar to how they do it
on the pilgrimage.
“It’s such a beautiful experience in
Lourdes and we realize that for many
people this is the closest they’re going
to get,” said Ann Sanders, an Order
of Malta Dame who co-chaired the
World Day of the Sick event with Katy
Calderon.
Tom Condon was one of those in attendance
at the Mass, helping to bring
up the gifts for holy Communion.
Although he was seated at the Mass
in a wheelchair — having severe arthritis
in his hips that makes it difficult
to stand or walk for long periods of
time — Condon, 85, was not simply
a bystander to the World Day of the
Sick Mass or the Order of Malta
organization that helps put it on.
For years, Condon served as the first
Los Angeles president of the Order of
Malta, the service organization whose
history goes back nearly 1,000 years.
As a successful businessman in the
securities industry, he transferred his
talents to use for giving back and helping
others.
“I found it very uplifting,” said Condon,
who, along with his wife, Julie,
was in the Order of Malta’s second
class, which is rarer. “Things that I
had never done personally over the
years.
“I really got to a point that I looked
forward to it immensely.”
Condon has had a unique experience
with the Order of Malta. After
years of leading and serving during the
Order of Malta’s sponsored pilgrimages
to Lourdes, France — where
malades (“sick” or “disabled people”)
are taken to the grotto and spiritual
baths of Our Lady of Lourdes —
Condon spent his 10th time on the
pilgrimage, not as a worker, but as a
malade himself.
“As a malade, I could sense the care
and loving that people put in it themselves,”
Condon said. “It’s not a chore,
it’s a privilege.”
Sanders had the opposite experience
of Condon: She first went to Lourdes
as a malade and later served on pilgrimages
as a nurse.
“It was very humbling,” said Sanders,
who went to Lourdes in between
kidney transplant surgeries due to a
genetic disease. “But it’s such a boost
Massgoers revere the brand-new statue of
Our Lady of Lourdes procured especially
for this year’s World Day of the Sick Mass. |
VICTOR ALEMÁN
to your spiritual life. To experience
that and to feel God’s love in so many
ways.
“They just showered you with love
and you knew that that love was God
working through them. Now being in
the Order as a Dame of Malta, I get
to now be the one that allows God to
work through me and now share that
love with those that we take on the
trip.”
As someone who spent his life serving
the sick and the suffering — and
who is now the recipient of such care
after his wife died in 2021 — Condon,
dressed during the Mass in his Order
of Malta uniform, appreciates even
more the organization’s mission to aid
those who are ill or debilitated.
“You can tell when you go to a hospital,
you can tell that the person taking
care of you is because it’s a job,” Condon
said. “When you go someplace
like Lourdes where the person is there
because they want to be involved and
want to take care of you, you can feel
the love.”
Mike Cisneros is the associate editor
of Angelus.
February 23, 2024 • ANGELUS • 19