Monday, March 24, 2014

The Pope...

...has called for  24 hours of continuous prayer, with one church in each diocese allocated for this:  and in London (diocese of Westminster)  this will be at St Patrick's, Soho, from Friday 28th March at 4pm to Saturday 29th March at 4pm. They are calling for volunteers to pray through the night. This is one of the most beautiful churches in London, and is associated with lots of missionary work, street evangelisation, and so on...

I was at  St Patrick's for Mass on Sunday, crossing London  on my way home from visiting an elderly relative in Somerset.  5pm Mass. Lots of people - who, as always, chose to sit in the middle or towards the back, leaving the front benches free for...who? I  didn't like to trundle my suitcase up there, but the church was filling up and it seemed silly to crowd at the back...I took a moderate somewhere-in-the-front-half-of-the-church option. One or two people who ventured into the front  territory looked like brave pioneers.

Somerset was lush and green...as the meadows which were lakes a couple of weeks ago are now draining out, with puddles and great swathes of mud. We did a wheelchair trundle along the sea front and then made enjoyed an excellent Tea with Cakes in a Tea Shop...

2 comments:

Malcolm said...

In Leeds it will be our parish.

But unfortunately I'd arranged to visit my sister in Cheltenham on that day, so I won't be able to participate. A shame, because the new Pope has some extremely good ideas, and he deserves support.

Jane said...

Retrospectively, which was the allocated church in the Diocese of Southwark Joanna? I didn`t hear any news of this request from Pope Francis other than on your blog, for which thanks.