The Mighty Denim Maxi-skirt & Other Pilgrimage Essentials

I finished my pilgrimage this morning with mass at the FSSP chapel and then reading along to a sung

Te Deum on YouTube at home. Naturally my papers get first crack at the stories, but I will write here a handy-dandy guide to surviving the Chartres Pilgrimage, which means, actually, getting to Chartres Cathedral on your own two aching feet, not on the emergency mini-bus or in an ambulance. There was a point where I let go of any other hope or expectation.

PREPARING

The pilgrims were supposed to assemble at 5:30 AM on Saturday morning outside the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris. We got up the next day at 5 AM, and the third day at 5:30 AM. This means that if you had jet lag, you were sunk. Sunk. Although the UK is only one hour behind France, and although I had practiced waking up at 6 AM for two weeks, I felt really rotten getting up at what was for me 4:15 AM.  I regret taking the later, cheaper Friday flight to Paris. I wish I had spent the extra £30 to take the earlier flight. That way I could have had a decent Parisian supper and gone to bed at 10 PM  France time (or earlier) instead of at 11:30 PM.

Lesson learned 1: Go to Paris early and get a decent night's sleep.

My hotel was ten minutes maximum from Notre Dame de Paris, which was excellent. Yes, it cost me $180 Canadian, but it was worth it to be so close. For one thing, my one-wheeled suitcase was a beast.

Lesson learned 2: Pay the price for the centrally located hotel.

Lesson learned 3: Don't take a one-wheeled suitcase.

EATING

My first morning began foully, for I forced myself to eat my homemade sugar-free muesli with coconut milk. I didn't much like it at home, and I absolutely loathed it in a tiny expensive Paris hotel room at 5:15 AM. Afterwards, I ate less than a third of all my carefully packed rations (and no more of the muesli) because I was so tired, I couldn't make myself eat them, let alone use a knife and fork. On Sunday night and Monday morning I had just enough energy and time to stuff some blueberries in my mouth, like a squirrel or a bear, if bears use their paws to facilitate eating. Believe me, on the Saturday and Sunday evenings by the time I had pitched my tent, I was like a bear crawling into its cave--a cranky bear with sore feet with not enough reason to know how to open a tin of herring, let alone wield a can opener. 

Lesson learned 4: Bring only food you can eat piece by piece, preferably out of small zip-lock bags, using only your hands, if possible.  Good food: nuts, seeds, berries, homemade fruit-and-nut bars, apples, small cans of John West tuna (for lunch), kabanosy (long, thin, dried Polish sausages), dark chocolate. Bad food: tinned herring, tinned salmon, little containers of tomato and spinach, avocados, lemon and lime. (I had a marvellous idea that I would make avocado-tomato salad with lime juice at the camp site, and eat it dantily from a plate with a knife and fork. Ah ha ha ha ha!) The pilgrimage organizers provided pilgrims with bottled water (lots and lots), apples (on the first day) coffee, hot chocolate, bread and soup. I was too tired to both queue up for the porta-loos and then get my cup and come back for soup, so I never had any soup. It looked and smelled nice... broccoli...

Lesson Learned 5: Take a cup and a fork. That's all you will use. 

Lesson Learned 6: When you get to camp, tie your cup to yourself and take it everywhere, so that you can get coffee/hot chocolate/soup on the way to or back from the loos and/or the Foreigners' Luggage Truck. 

HYGIENE

One of the seasoned pilgrims told me that she just doesn't wash during the pilgrimage. I felt that as an old Girl Guide, brought up to strictest standards of camp cleanliness, I would certainly wash myself and brush my teeth. This did not happen, except for my feet. After pondering my podiatrist's advice to ice my feet at the end of each day--no fridge, no ice--I brought a plastic tub in my suitcase and a little squeezy bottle of antiseptic soap. After putting up my tent and crawling in, like a bear, I would take out my tub, strip my feet, put them in the tub, squeeze soap on them and pour over one whole litre of bottled water I had carried from the last rest stop. HEAVEN. 

Lesson Learned 7:  Enjoy your hot showers and teeth-brushing in hotel before and in hotel afterwards, for washing and teeth-brushing will not happen during. Let go of the expectation of washing or brushing teeth during. Won't happen. You will be too tired and it may be too cold. 

Lesson Learned 8: Bringing a tub for the feet is totally worth it. 

There are loos. The queues for the loos are long. Sometimes you have to give up hope of using the loo, or brace yourself to run a kilometre to catch up with your chapter after using the loo. There are no sinks (obviously), so you can not wash your hands afterwards.

Lesson Learned 9: Carry hand sanitizer in your pocket at all times or just accept that you have become, at best, pre-modern and, at worst, an animal.

Lesson Learned 10: Pray, sisters, that you not get your period on or just before the pilgrimage. Naturally you cannot help it if you do, but your life will be better if you don't. 

Lesson Learned 11: I brought wet wipes. Bring wet wipes.

COMFORT

Ah ha ha ha ha! Ah ha ha ha ha! Excuse me while I wipe away a tear of mirth. 

Lesson Learned 12: Bring a sit-upon, for you will be sitting in mud during breaks, kneeling on gravel for Whitsunday Mass, and (if your group is luckily one of the groups allowed to hear Mass inside Chartres cathedral---you can't fit 10,000 people in Chartres cathedral) kneeling on a cold, cold stone floor for Whitmonday Mass. A sit-upon can be a piece cut out of an old yoga mat or a newspaper wrapped in a plastic bag and taped shut. 

Lesson Learned 13: You can't bring too many socks. Wool for the day's walking, cotton for camp, more wool (or bamboo fibre) to pull over the cotton for sleeping.

Lesson Learned 14: The north of France is naturally muddy. It doesn't have to rain; it's just muddy. As you tramp up to your ankles in mud, wondering why it is so muddy when it hasn't rained, you will suddenly remember everything you ever heard about the French battlefields of the First (and possibly also Second) World War. If Canadian, a Canadian near you will make reference to Vimy Ridge. 

Lesson Learned 15: The North of France can be cold in mid-May. All those images you have of warm, sunny France are of the SOUTH. Buy the warmest sleeping bag you can afford (as I did) and bring thermal underwear (as I didn't). 

HEALTH

Feet first was my motto. No matter how much you deny Mr Stomach and Mr Bowels, you have to take care of Mr Feet. By Monday morning, I was actually arguing with my feet, pointing out how I had been putting them first, washing them so lovingly, soaking them in my tub, and giving them fresh band-aids, blister plasters and socks instead of eating and before queuing for the loo. 

Lesson Learned 16: Have a well-stocked first aid zip-lock freezer bag and take it everywhere.

What almost felled me at the end was not my feet but an angelic-looking little blue-eyed blond boy who went down the loo queue during the Monday lunch break with a plate of French sausage bits. Instead of thinking "Don't talk meat from strangers when it is (for once) hot out", I thought, "Oh how nice" and took a piece. Two minutes later I was doubled over in agony, thinking something VERY BAD was about to happen in public, and when--thank God--a man gave me his place in his queue and  I was in the safety and privacy of the loo, my head swam, I saw spots, and I thought I was going to pass out right there in the loo. It was over.

Fortunately, I recovered sufficiently to be ministered to by the fathers and mothers of the chapter who offered to take me to the nearby doctor, offered me glucose pills and said "It was too fast for food poisoning. It must be low blood sugar!" The chaplain (Father Mark Rowe) threw me a bread roll from his Priest's Rations (see footnote below), and after I ate some, I felt much, much better.

Lesson Learned 17: Never take meat from a plate offered by a stranger on Day 3 of the Chartres Pilgrimage, even if he looks like a little baby angel. 

Lesson Learned 18: Being on a low-carb diet  for three weeks before the Chartres Pilgrimage is probably not the best idea ever.

One of our party got a throat infection, poor boy, and by Tuesday's flight home, the chapter had run out of paracetamol. 

Lesson Learned 19: Bring enough painkiller for both you and a friend.

Incidentally: I applied sunblock throughout, wore my wide-brimmed French Guide hat in all daylight hours and wore sunglasses. Therefore, I was never sunburned. Amazingly, the French weather can be cold and cloudy one moment and blazing hot and sunny the next. It was like this all through Whitsunday Mass: freeze, burn, freeze, burn. How both my Scottish great-grandfather and his Canadian son my grandfather survived the French weather alone--never mind the Germans--during the World Wars is now a wonder to me. 

Lesson Learned 20: Weather in Ile de France and the Loire Valley is weird and changeable. 

LANGUAGES

It's a Traddy Pilgrimage in France: there will be Latin and a lot of French. Not a minute I spent reviewing French prayers and tourist phrases was wasted.

Lesson Learned 21: It is worth reviewing your French, and even improving it for next time. 

SPIRITUALITY

I will save most of this for my newspapers, but this is above all a Traditional Catholic Pilgrimage, and unless you are a Catholic who loves the faith and its traditional theology and devotions, you will not get this pilgrimage. Not to trash the Camino, but it's not the Camino. Aging hippies love the Camino; aging hippies would not last the first day of the Chartres pilgrimage.

Lesson Learned 22: It's the real thing.

CHARTRES PILGRIM PACKING LIST

If I go again (and many a time as I walked did I think "Never"), I will bring the following:

Backpack (NOT suitcase)

Tent

Sleeping bag

Air mattress

Air pillow

Pillow case

Plastic tub

Small bottle of anti-bacterial liquid soap

Lamp (to hang from hook at top of tent) 

Flashlight (if you have aging eyes, you will also need this to read the Pilgrimage Missal in cathedrals during Mass, so keep it in your day bag)

Small knapsack

Garbage bag(s) for waterproofing (i.e. bundling the still-damp tent into before shoving it in my suitcase)

Sit-upon

Fork

Cup

3 tins John West tuna

3-6 apples

12 (at least) homemade fruit-and-nut bars

3 packages (at least) kabanosy

100 g dark chocolate

Bag of mixed nuts and seeds

Granola bars (in case of another Low Blood Sugar Incident)

Easy-peel oranges (because if not easy, won't bother)

500 g water bottle 

Mineral replacement tablets

First Aid bag with antiseptic wipes, plasters, blister plasters, scissors (crucial), etc.

Ear-plugs (very important for remaining in charity with fellow pilgrims at night)

Small folded rain jacket (even though I didn't need it this time)

Tiny folded umbrella (ditto)

Money belt for passports, wallet, money (from which I received HUGE peace of mind)

Passport &  UK Resident Visa

Euros (esp. denominations of 5 and 10)

£20

Toothbrush with head-protector (for hotels)

Toothpaste (ditto)

Wet wipes

Hand sanitiser

Sunblock

2 packages of paper tissues

Paracetamol (enough to share)

Rosary 

Notebook

Pen

Meditation (if agreed to give a mediation again)

Chapter song & hymn book (with  "500 miles" glued in)

Guide (or other wide-brimmed) hat

Light quilted country jacket

4 cotton/linen long-sleeved shirts

4 T-shirts for under long-sleeved shirts (sounds crazy in May, but I am so grateful I took the hiking advice for temperate climates in Survival)

The Mighty and Indestructible Denim Maxi-Skirt of Female Traddery

Underwear without elastic around the leg-holes 

Four days' worth wool/special hiking socks

Three night's worth cotton socks (not for walking)

Two night's worth knee-length socks (bamboo fibre good)

Hiking boots

Tennis shoes (for campsite)

Sunglasses

Cotton neckerchief

Warm shawl/scarf/pashmina

Woolly hat (for cold camp nights)

Woolly gloves (for cold, damp mornings, esp when striking tent)

Thermal underwear for sleeping in

Nightgown

Thin dressing gown for modesty's sake in loo queue

Cute outfit worthy of French restaurants
Lipstick

Naturally absolutely everything should be packed in plastic, waterproof, preferably zip-lock freezer bags. 

I was going to include a list of things I brought but never used, but that would be just too depressing!

*Priests' Rations: My friend Berenike once told me that "A fat priest is the pride of his [Polish] village." I have been thinking that over for years, and at last I understand it. Although too many priests deserve to have their bottoms kicked from here to Hereford, traditionalists are second to none in our respect for the Sacred Priesthood. Also, we naturally want them to come to our pilgimages so as to hear our confessions, lead the rosaries, read the meditations, say mass and throw us their bread rolls when we have low blood sugar (see above). Therefore, priests on the Chartres Pilgrimage do not share the some primitive lifestyle as the pilgrims but have camp beds in their tents, special snacks and meals laid on in special covered trays. It's very, very nice for priests, dear priests!. There are lots of priests there--some of them just stand with their breveries by the side of the road waiting for penitents--but I believe more would always be welcome. Priests who both love the Traditional Latin Mass and play the bagpipes would be particularly prized by the Scottish chapter. 

Sunshine on Leith

It's a wonderful day for a long walk: sunny, mild, not too windy, hardly a cloud in the sky.

"How was Mass?" asked Benedict Ambrose when I phoned him from the bus home.

"Was that today?" I moaned.

When you decide to walk seven miles to Leith instead of just continuing the final two miles to Fountainbridge, it kind of erases the morning. Besides, I can't believe that was just seven miles. At least two sections of the path were closed, and so I had to take detours which probably added to the tally.

Just so I can prove my mind has not turned to mush, here is what I did today.

5:15 Woke up naturally. Why, oh why?

6:00 Woke up again, to alarm.

6:50 Left the house.

7:13 Caught the train. Yay!

8:00 Mass in the Extraordinary Form. St. Antoninus today.

9:00 Coffee in  'Noir' while reading Kazio i szkoła pełna wampirów. I will not be upset if I do not finish this one. It is just wrong for Poles to take vampires lightly. I hope the book has been denounced on some church bulletin board in Wielkapolska.

9:38: Train to Edinburgh Park

9:50: Bought two-man tent. At last, at last B.A. and I have a home we can truly call our own. I paid for it myself, out of my own earnings. No mortgage necessary. That said, it comes with only a two-year guarantee, which is like buying a cookie cutter "dream home" in some ghastly Toronto suburb that was arable land with cows six months ago.

10:15: Reapply sunblock. Begin to walk along Union Canal, in direction of Edinburgh, with tent sticking out of my knapsack. Pray rosary for first twenty minutes, hoping not to encounter Orangeman, Hearts fan, or, worst of all, bitter ex-Catholic with scary dog.

11:00: Take break at Water of Leith Conservation Centre. Drink tea from thermos flask. Eat homemade fruit and nut bar with gusto. Reapply sunblock.

11:15: Decide to walk the 7 miles along the Water of Leith to Leith.

12:15: Realize I can just pop up a flight of stairs from the path and have a delicious salad, water and a rest at the Modern Art Gallery--all for £4. Eat, drink, reapply sunblock.

12:50: Continue march to Leith.

1:15 ish: Reach Stockbridge which has its usual distractions. Buy pretty rose-spangled skirt from favourite charity shop, 100% cotton, £5.49. Could not have fit into it two weeks ago. Let no-one tell me low-calorie diets do not work. Yes, will quit after eight weeks are up. (Looks shifty.)

1:45 ish. Canon Mills and the "Earthy Store". Buy big bag of Hummus Chips "for B.A."

2:00: Start wondering if I will ever get to Leith. Drink tea from thermos. Reapply sunblock. Sunblock has leaked into ziplock bag. Yay me, for having put it in a ziplock bag in the first place!

2:30: Shore! Shore!  Put out fire in cigarette butt section on top of trash bin with remains of tea. Toddle over to Martin Wishart to see how much the "Tasting Menu" costs. £80. Woo. Do not expect to be taken to Martin Wishart any time soon. The ordinary lunch looks quite reasonable, however.

2:35: Where is bus? There must be a bus to the Historical House around. Must find bus.... Walk around hopefully until see sign for Ocean Terminal. Walk with resignation to Ocean Terminal

2:45 ish: Ocean Terminal. Just take a bus going in the right direction and trust to luck, which turns out to be good.  Get out on street I recognize and take second bus.

3:30: Home! Strip off boots, socks. Grab water, hummus and handful of hummus chips. Fill plastic basin with cold soapy water and place beside sitting-room couch. Put in feet. Ahhhhhh!

Update: I completely forgot about Traddy Tuesday. Well, training for the Chartres Pilgrimage counts as traddy, I hope. Not being a fan of pain-for-pain's-sake, I sincerely hope it is not "more traditional" just to rush in and walk 40 km the first day with baby-soft feet.

No Vigil Masses for Holy Days of Obligation in Edinburgh?

It would seem that there are no Vigil Masses for Holy Days of Obligation in Edinburgh.* This is surprising as there are several Vigil Masses for Sundays in Edinburgh, and whereas there are some people who simply have to work on Sundays, there are even more who work on Thursdays. Sunday: not usually a work day. Thursday: usually a work day.

"The point is that one is supposed to go to Mass on a Holy Day of Obligation," said my helpful informant, perhaps a little too strictly.

"Sundays are Holy Days of Obligation, and yet there are vigils for them," I pointed out. There's even a vigil for Christmas, come to think of it.

It's been a while since I had a good theological argument. However, I let it go with a kindly "Manpower issues, I imagine."  (At the current rate of attrition, Edinburgh-St. Andrews will have a grand total of 30 full-time priests in 2035.  Currently the diocese has about 129, including retirees.)

Anyway, there are a number of morning and evening Masses in Edinburgh to cover the Feast of the Ascension (tomorrow) which in Scotland has not been shifted to Sunday. Be aware that various church and Daily Mass websites are completely out of date, so your best bet is to phone the church-of-your-choice ahead of time if you can't get to your usual parish/Mass centre.

Further complicating matters for the faithful this year are the Scottish elections, which are also tomorrow. Sigh. Vigil Masses before a work day which also involves elections would have been very pastoral but, well ... manpower issues.

*UPDATE (7:13 PM): Source lacking information. The Archbishop himself is saying a Vigil Mass from 7 PM at St. Kentigern's in Barton. Sigh.

The Five Wounds No Laughing Matter

Bad taste/probably-unintentional-blasphemy warning on this link to a pious cartoon.

My reaction to the cartoon is in this week's Toronto Catholic Register.

Commemoration of Saint Dorothy

In the late 1960s someone decided she didn't exist, so her feast day was dropped from the General Roman Calendar of saints. But her bones lie under the beautiful altar of a church in Trastevere, so someone explain! Fortunately the Old Calendar goes with the Old Mass, and so today my delighted ears heard the old prayers to my saint ring out from the sanctuary.

Here's Father Hopkins on the subject of the girl saint so beloved by the English, and by many others too:

1. For a Picture of St. Dorothea

I BEAR a basket lined with grass; I am so light, I am so fair, That men must wonder as I pass And at the basket that I bear, Where in a newly-drawn green litter         5 Sweet flowers I carry,—sweets for bitter. Lilies I shew you, lilies none, None in Caesar’s gardens blow,— And a quince in hand,—not one Is set upon your boughs below;         10 Not set, because their buds not spring; Spring not, ’cause world is wintering. But these were found in the East and South Where Winter is the clime forgot.— The dewdrop on the larkspur’s mouth         15 O should it then be quench`d not? In starry water-meads they drew These drops: which be they? stars or dew? Had she a quince in hand? Yet gaze: Rather it is the sizing moon.         20 Lo, linkèd heavens with milky ways! That was her larkspur row.—So soon? Sphered so fast, sweet soul?—We see Nor fruit, nor flowers, nor Dorothy. See Notes.

Why Learn Polish?

Happy Saint Agatha's Day. Saint Agatha was not Polish, but she was the subject of a stirring sermon at First Friday Mass at my parish church circa 1979. At least one child went home afterwards and looked her up in Butler's Lives of the Saints to see what was so terrible about her death that the priest didn't want to tell us. Good psychology there, Father Bill. In honour of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Saint Agatha that now middle-aged child will begin the Nine Fridays today. Without anyone ever telling us what we were doing, my entire elementary school practiced the Nine Fridays for years. May we all be granted final perseverance despite our subsequent slacking.

But the topic of this Polski Piątek (Polish Friday) post is "Why Learn Polish?"--a not infrequent question to adult students of Polish. The habitual starter and quitter of language learning may often ask herself such a question, particularly after bruising arguments with Poles, e.g. on the topic of "Is stupid learning Polish."

So here is a fine list to brace faltering Polish learners and convince the curious:

1. Polish is the most important Slavic language west of Russia in terms of influence in Europe (particularly central-eastern Europe) and probably the USA.

2. It is harder than Russian, so if you learn it, Russian will be a snap.

3. Polish is very handy for holidays and pilgrimages in Poland.

4. Polish is now the "second language" of both Scotland and England.

5. Learning Polish will help stave off dementia. So will learning any other language, apparently, but Polish is just that much more of a mental workout.

6. Top Polish literature is so great in translation, it must be even better in Polish.

7. Polish teachers are kind to their students and bring them Polish sweets. If class falls on Tłusty Czwartek (Fat Thursday, the Thursday before Ash Wednesday), the teacher brings Polish doughnuts. FACT.

8. Poles are kinder to foreigners attempting to speak Polish than Other People I Could Mention when you attempt to speak their language. They are even kinder than (real, living-in-Italy) Italians about it, which is very kind indeed. Their attitude seems to be that of Samuel Johnson regarding women preaching:  It is not done well, but they are surprised to find it done at all.

9. Listened to objectively, Polish is quite beautiful. There is a feminine beauty to "Tylko miłość jest ważna" that "Only love is important" does not have. I mean, really: imm-porr--tant.  Bang, bang, thump. And "luv" is rather dull compared to the dramatic "mee-washch". And "tylko" could be played on a xylophone. Bing-bing MEE-washch yest soft-sweet.

10. Saint John Paul II thought and prayed his most personal prayers in Polish. Think about that. Consider also Sister Faustina if you're a big Faustina fan.

11. Polish Pretend Daughter said you could never do it. "It is too difficult." How maddening is that? And it may be this thought that actually sustains you through the years and makes you take up your pen and memorize another chunk of Polish complaint composed by your Polish teacher because:

12. Polish is the language of the stubborn and bloody-minded. It would survive a nuclear holocaust, or so said the new Polish professor at the University of Toronto four years ago. The desire to learn it and speak it will force you to become braver than you are and to appreciate the courage of others who strive to master foreign-to-them languages.

Pious Jokes about Jesus?

Dear Calvinist Cath, do give this post a miss for it will pain your noble soul and excite your conscience into fervent prayers for the reformation of your Catholic friends, which would be a waste of time, as we aren't budging. (Prayers for our salvation, however, gratefully requested. Here's a present of my favourite "ecumenical" poem ever.)

In Cath's Scottish Presbyterian tradition, no depictions of the Blessed Trinity are permitted. This makes art class embarrassing for children of her community when they are asked to draw Baby Jesus around Christmas time. First, they don't celebrate feast days, just Sundays, and second, they consider drawings of Baby Jesus idolatrous. No wonder they feel rather testy at Christmas. (Sad irony: as Christians they are more likely to get pious Christmas cards from co-workers than snowman cards whereas they would much prefer the snowman, if they have to get Christmas cards at all.)

Scottish Presbyterians have a lot of insights into the transcendence of God; hopefully they can learn something about His immanence from Catholics. Not sure how, exactly, when we are the auld enemy of all time, but everything is possible for the Holy Spirit. 

What a Scottish Presbyterian would think of this  (Cath, don't click) is quite beyond the courage of my imagination to contemplate. Not to repeat Pope Francis' insistence (surely badly translated) that there is "no Catholic God" or to approve the deplorable innovation of giving  Protestants the Blessed Sacrament, but one wonders when looking at such stuff if some Catholics think we own God instead of God owning us.

For example, Catholics know perfectly well that Christian tradition gave birth to Christian scriptures, not the other way around. There was a Church before there was a writing down of the Gospels. Some assume the Blessed Virgin Mary told Saint Luke the histories that form the Infant Narratives, which does indeed seem the most likely explanation, especially when you consider the beautiful and sacred verse "But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart" (Luke 2:20). However, to what extent should Catholics--and other Christians--riff on the Christian scriptures?  

Here's a particularly egregious example, which this blog would not link to, if the pious cartoonist could be suspected of impious or intentionally blasphemous motives: [Don't click, Cath, I mean it. You will be sorry.]

Did your stomach flip over? There is a slim chance Americans will not find this so horrible; obviously the American cartoonist finds nothing wrong with it, so there's a possibility it might be a cultural thing.

But what makes this take on Sacred Scripture (and the Sacred Wounds) particularly awful for those who find it offensive is the unmediated quality of images. When people write down their ideas, you have to actually engage your intellect to read them. But when someone draws a picture, it goes right through your eyes to your gut/the passions. Freedom of speech is NOT the same as freedom of expression, for ideas are not the same as pictures. For example, no-one has developed a marriage-destroying porn habit from Fanny freaking Hill.  And nobody has stabbed a priest, murdered a nun or set fire to an embassy over Contra Gentiles.

On the one hand, some people argue that those who are offended by images should "grow up". They seem to think that the less you are offended by imagery, the more sophisticated you are. But on the other, one wonders what the ultimate outcome would be, especially considering the lengths some artists will go to provoke anger and grief in Christians. Would our refusal to protest or express anger eventually lead to a dying of Christian devotion in our souls? Graham Greene's Monsignor Quixote went bananas when he perceived a gross insult to Our Lady. Saint Ignatius almost killed a Moor over her honour. Are we really so better than they are when we shrug and remain silent?

And what about when the offensive image or joke is innocently meant?  Pious teenagers in Toronto in the 1980s had an argument that went like this:

Jokester: And then Jesus said, "Let he who is without sin throw the first stone." Everyone just stood there and then all of a sudden a stone came out of nowhere and bopped the woman taken in adultery in the head. And then Jesus said, "Aw, Mom!"

Half the Pious Audience: Ha, ha, ha!

Other Half of the Audience: Tsk. As if Our Lady would ever have done that. Tsk. 

First Half: Aw, come on. Lighten up. It's a joke. You see, Our Lady was conceived without sin, so...

Second Half: We know why it's supposed to be funny, but it isn't actually funny. It's an insult to our Lady.

Jokester: Aw. 

First Half: Lighten up!

So the question for reflection is, is it okay to make jokes about Jesus? Will jokes about Jesus lead us more firmly to devotion to Him, or will they erode our filial respect for Almighty God?  Will the Sacred Wounds cease to be objects of devotion as they become material for peek-a-boo jokes? And, admittedly a minor consideration unless you live in England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, Canada, the USA, Mexico, Latin America, Korea, Japan or somewhere in the entire continent of Africa, what would the Protestants say?

Keeping the Divine in Mercy

The devotion to the Divine Mercy began in Poland, and as far as World Youth Day in Krakow is concerned, it would seem that the Year of Mercy is the Year of Divine Mercy.

The official hymn of  World Youth Day 2016 is called "Blessed are the Merciful".

The text & a rough translation:

1. Wznoszę swe oczy ku górom, skąd
Przyjdzie mi pomoc;
Pomoc od Pana, wszak Bogiem On
Miłosiernym jest!

I raise my eyes unto the hills, whence
cometh my help;
help from the Lord; after all He 
is a Merciful God!

2. Kiedy zbłądzimy, sam szuka nas,
By w swe ramiona wziąć,
Rany uleczyć Krwią swoich ran,
Nowe życie tchnąć!

R: Błogosławieni miłosierni,
albowiem oni miłosierdzia dostąpią!

When we stray, He looks for us, 
so as to take us in His arms,
to heal our wounds with the Blood of His wounds,
to breathe new life!

R: Blessed are the merciful
for they shall obtain mercy!

3. Gdyby nam Pan nie odpuścił win,
Któż ostać by się mógł?
Lecz On przebacza, przeto i my
Czyńmy jak nasz Bóg!

If the Lord did not forgive faults
who could stand?
But He forgives,and  therefore let's
forgive like our God!

4. Pan Syna Krwią zmazał wszelki dług,
Syn z grobu żywy wstał;
„Panem jest Jezus” – mówi w nas Duch.
Niech to widzi świat!

With the Son's Blood the Lord has wiped out every debt,
the Son arose living from the grave.
"Jesus is Lord" says the Spirit within us.
May the world see it!

[BRIDGE]

Więc odrzuć lęk i wiernym bądź,
Swe troski w Panu złóż
I ufaj, bo zmartwychwstał i wciąż
Żyje Pan, Twój Bóg!

And so throw away fear and be faithful,
place your concern in the Lord 
and trust [in Him] because He is risen and still
the Lord lives, your God!

R: Błogosławieni miłosierni,
albowiem oni miłosierdzia dostąpią!

R: Blessed are the merciful

for they shall obtain mercy!

Update: The Official English version--which has a somewhat different musical presentation--follows the Official Polish one in the film.