Deeper respect for life

The stark contrast between a brutal de-humanizing concentration camp in Dachau, Germany and the respect for all humanity at the Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes in France was part of a pilgrimage/retreat that 41 faculty members from the University of Mary’s School of Health Science attended this past August. 
 
The 11-day “Dignity of the Human Person” pilgrimage was inspired by University President, Msgr. James Shea, to impress faculty and ultimately students, with a deep respect for life. “I wanted them to see what happens when medical science turns away from the care of the human person, then I wanted them to see what happens when it turns towards the dignity of people,” Msgr. Shea explained.
 
Lourdes is especially dear to him; a place he has visited many times, including many years ago to discern if he should be a candidate for the job of university president and a year ago to take the architect of the school’s own Lourdes-inspired grotto.
 
Taking the entire department that is specifically dedicated to caring for people, came about through the generosity of a group from Palm Springs that belongs to Legatus, a Catholic Leadership organization. Msgr. Shea had been leading a retreat for them every summer and shared with them his dream for such a pilgrimage. The Legatus group offered to pay the expense of the trip if they could come along.
 
“Being faculty in the school of health sciences in a Catholic University, the dignity of the person has always been at the forefront of our thought," Dr. Jodi Roller, Dean, School of Health Sciences, explained. “Through the pilgrimage, every feeling about human dignity became more profound.”
 
With 900 professional students that will interact with these pilgrims, Roller said that the minds and hearts of students who are their successors in health care will also change. “It will have an exponential effect on today’s cultural mindset,” she said.
 
The group began in Paris, seeing an art display and a museum on the history of medicine, then travelled to the hills of southern Germany to Eichstatt, the home of St. Walburga’s Abbey. The Abbey, which will celebrate its 1000th anniversary in 18 years, is one of 36 Benedictine monasteries including our own Annunciation Monastery. The pilgrims joined the sisters for vespers and Mass and were blessed by the liquid known as St. Walburga oil that has flowed from the saint’s bones for over 1,000 years.
 
The defilement of humanity
From Eichstatt, they went to a concentration camp in Dachau and learned of the horrors that had been inflicted on those deemed inferior by the Nazis, such as Jews or enemies of the state such as Catholic priests who spoke the truth. The pilgrims heard about medical experiments inflicted on prisoners, walked through the barracks, and saw the room prisoners were gassed to death in and the two crematoriums that burned their remains.
 
William Littlefield, an instructor with the university’s Emerging Leaders Academy, described Dachau as profound. “I tried to emotionally and spiritually place myself in the mindset of a prisoner;” he said. “Upon entering the gates of Dachau, I felt this overwhelming sensation of stillness and darkness surround my very being.”
 
Every step of the way, he said they witnessed inhumane conditions such as the prisoners’ barracks with three levels of wall-to-wall bunk beds. Each bed held four prisoners with no space between beds and neither insulation nor ventilation.
 
Upon seeing images of prisoners, Littlefield said he was overwhelmed. “Words cannot describe the looks of sorrow and shame on these prisoners.” he said. “Seeing their sunken eyes, as well as literally every bone in their bodies was depressing. We were shown a photo of killed prisoners thrown together in a pile. Many of us from our group lost it at this point because it was simply too much to take in all at once. These victims didn't even look like humans; they looked like piles of bone and skin.”

That experience, according to Littlefield, impressed on everyone just how fragile our human rights are and how crucial it is for those rights to be protected. “Members of the School of Health Sciences here at the University of Mary have a great responsibility moving forward,” he said. “We must understand how important it is for us to gently shape and form not just the minds, but also the hearts of our future healthcare leaders.” He noted the importance of ethics in healthcare. “If we do not properly form our youth, we will simply repeat what the Nazis did all those years ago.”
 
Healings at Lourdes, France
The next day, the group visited the Nuremburg courtroom where those responsible for the Holocaust were tried. From there they went to Lourdes, France, stopping for Mass in Toulouse at the tomb of St. Thomas Aquinas, the patron of universities and students. 
 
They stayed in Lourdes for five days. Some of the time was spent in direct service to the sick and disabled pilgrims who come to bathe in the miraculous spring, which was revealed to St. Bernadette Soubirous during an apparition in 1858. Each day, the group joined thousands from around the world in Eucharistic procession led by people in wheelchairs and stretchers and the candlelight rosary procession every evening.
 
Dr. Alessandro de Franciscis, the medical officer and president of the Medical Findings Office in Lourdes, spent time lecturing the group and led them on a tour through the hospital.
 
As medical professionals, the group could be inducted into the medical bureau.  They had the opportunity to hear a case history of a reported miraculous cure and meet the man. The group was asked to vote on whether the case should move forward for further investigation. It was a unanimous “yes” based on the mandatory criteria: a diagnosed incurable disease with a permanent, spontaneous cure, and no natural explanation. There have been only 69 miraculous cures the Church has officially attributed to the water at Lourdes.
 
By the end of the Lourdes experience, before returning home, Roller said the entire group shared how deeply touched the whole experience had been. “These pilgrims have internalized thoughts about human dignity in a more profound way,” she said. “Teaching about human dignity will become more explicit in our mission.”