International Eucharistic Congress: fast approaching ...

My trip to Quebec is rather exciting! I haven't been on a long haul flight before, so I have no idea how I will cope with being cooped up on a plane for the transatlantic flight. I have got the flight socks (I was not given any choice in this, since the person I am travelling with has no intention of spending our time in Quebec visiting a hospital) and I have got two long books (William Hague's biography of Pitt the Younger, for the journey out, and of William Wilberforce, for the journey back). My travelling companion finally does believe that our accomodation is really booked (after Cologne 2005, we have promised ourselves always to have beds to sleep in on trips rather than a floor) and that we are registered with the Eucharistic Congress, and that Quebec is a real place.

Having been very taken by the idea of the Ark of the New Covenant that has been on pilgrimage, visiting Catholic communities around Canada, and most recently, being walked from the shrine of the Canadian Martyrs to Quebec (some 1000 km), one of the things I am very much looking forward to is seeing it "live". I used three of the icons from the Ark as themes for the Extended Days of Adoration in the parish this year.

The photograph shows the Ark during one of its visits. It looks as if the young children are having a careful look at the icons - providing a prompt to Eucharistic catechesis was the reason for the icons, so it is fulfilling that part of its purpose. It looks, too, as if the Eucharist is exposed in the monstrance on top of the Ark, again fulfilling the purpose of the Ark as being a prompt to Eucharistic celebration. Some might wish for a greater manifestation of adoration, but a "being at home" in the presence of the Lord during a time of children's adoration is something that I see in our parish on a "First Friday", and it is not necessarily irreverent.

And I realised yesterday that, since we will be away for 11 days, I need to set up the July "First Friday" before I go or I will miss my usual schedule of posters and advance notices. The theme for that is going to be that of the World Youth Day: "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses".