Lourdes, August 11 (CNA) - A Spanish man said this week that the pilgrimage he took in 2003 to the Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes was the beginning point of his conversion and the basis for a new book on his testimony.

Fifty one year-old Antonio Escobedo Garcia’s book “What Joy!” recounts that after suffering a “a grave lesion in the lumbar zone” of his back, a friend invited him to make a pilgrimage to Lourdes. “I agreed not because I thought I was going to be cured, but because I just wanted to get out and see the oaks and yew trees in the area, because I love trees and nature,” he said.

According to the AVAN news agency, Escobedo made the pilgrimage with his wife and experienced “a strong feeling” upon arriving at the Shrine.  “It was moving to see the masses of people from all over the world who were there and the fraternity that was present in the place and that everybody treated each other with,” he said, adding that at that moment he felt interiorly “the need to talk to the Virgin and for her to answer.”

In his book, he said the pilgrimage to Lourdes “did not physically cure my lesion in the lumbar zone, but I did feel a peace like I had never before felt, which has helped me day by day to face my serious pain with joy and serenity.”

Now Escobedo attends Mass every day and prays the Rosary with his wife and his four children. He also promotes the Rosary to hundreds of people in his hometown of Valencia.