The Order of Malta’s 50th International Pilgrimage to Lourdes took place from 2 to 7 May with some 8000 participants, including over 1500 sick, coming from 42 countries. Record numbers for a pilgrimage with a special character this year, as it was the first to be led by the Order’s new Grand Master Fra’ Matthew Festing, elected on 11 March last. It was also the celebration of the 150th Anniversary of the Apparitions and the 50th of the Order’s International Pilgrimage to Lourdes.
Noteworthy this year was the participation of the President of the Republic of Malta, Dr. Edward Fenech-Adami, who attended the main religious ceremonies, including the international mass officiated by Cardinal Pio Laghi.

“The situation here is dramatic,” Birke Herzbruch, project coordinator of Malteser International in Rangoon, says. “We have already received water purification tablets for the treatment of drinking water for the people in the district of Dawbon in Rangoon and the nearby poor rural settlement of Tantabin and their distribution starts tomorrow. This is what is needed immediately – no-one was prepared for such a catastrophe and so nobody had stocks,” Herzbruch explains. “As well, the city is in total darkness.” Malteser International is also preparing further aid measures, including distribution of plastic covers and mosquito nets. The Federal Foreign Office of Germany has given its verbal agreement to financially support the relief measures of Malteser International.

Here is the address Benedict XVI gave to the U.N. General Assembly in New York on 19 April. At the end the speech given by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to Benedict XVI.

Mr President,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

As I begin my address to this Assembly, I would like first of all to express to you, Mr President, my sincere gratitude for your kind words. My thanks go also to the Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki-moon, for inviting me to visit the headquarters of this Organization and for the welcome that he has extended to me. I greet the Ambassadors and Diplomats from the Member States, and all those present. Through you, I greet the peoples who are represented here. They look to this institution to carry forward the founding inspiration to establish a “centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends” of peace and development…

On 2 June 1247 at Alba Regia in central Hungary, King Bela IV signed an agreement with Rembaldo, Grand Preceptor of the Order of St. John. Known as the ‘Diploma of the Knights of St. John,’ this document is the earliest testimony of a direct link between the Order of St. John and the Romanian people, as well as the expression of the long-standing relationship between Romania and the Sovereign Order.
To celebrate these historic bonds, Ioan-Aurel POP, Professor of mediaeval history and historiography at the ‘Babes-Bolyai’ Cluj-Napoca University, gave a lecture on ‘Christianitas Europaea’, attended by Grand Master Fra’ Matthew Festing, at the Order’s Magistral Villa in Rome.

Grand Master Fra’ Matthew Festing’s first official meeting with the diplomatic missions accredited to the Sovereign Order of Malta.

Numerous ambassadors and members of diplomatic corps wanted to greet the new Grand Master and offer their personal good wishes and those of the countries they represent.