WYD

Okay what day is today, I guess it is Friday. It has been a long couple of days.

On Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, there have been morning catechetical sessions and mass at various parishes in the greater Toronto area. Each session is led by a Bishop, or two. The Bishops do Catechesis for 30 -45 minutes and then they have a question and answer session for the young people with the Bishops.

I was assigned to be a site coordinator at Salvador del Mundo parish, a Portuguese parish in the Mississisuaga and so I've had very interesting experiences.

On Wednesday, I got up at 5:30 am and caught a train at 6:10 to the end of the Toronto subway green line. The idea then was to take a bus to a stop near the parish so that I can be there to set things up. Well I was misinformed by a bus driver who took me 25 minutes north of my desitination. I then had to catch another bus to return me to the station. At this point I was a touch frazzled because I had to be at the parish by no later than 8 am.

I then took a cab but it so turned out that the cab driver did not know where the church was so that was another adventure. In fact, he got so lost that he had to stop, pause the meter and consult a map. I finally got there and thankfully there were great volunteers and musicians there and it made everything go smoothly.

The bishop at the site that day, which was wednesday was Archbishop Chaput of Denver. He was a very gracious and funny man, I liked him. He was easy going and made things flow smoothly. He delivered a very nice catechesis on being the salt of the earth. The pilgrims also responded well to him and asked quite a few questions.

Let me see if i can remember any questions . . . there was one that was basically a question about one true Church stuff and why we can't share Eucharist with other Christians. As is customary of the Archbishop, he does not skirt around such issues, his response was firm on the Church's position. I can't remember much else question and answer-wise, i guess I was in the back making sure that everything was all set for mass. We had about 12 priests and 2 Bishops celebrating so the logistics had to be worked out. But it was great.

Afterwards, we all had to take public transportation back to Exhibition Place which is ground zero for all the activities and where pilgrims get food. That took about 2 hours.

The food has not been too impressive. It probably tastes better than it looks. The way they do it is that you have to get in groups of six and a leader gets the food for the group. This cuts down on crowds at the food distribution place. They got his idea from Rome, which made more sense than trying to deal with thousands of individuals.

After lunch on Wednesday, i was totally run down. On Tuesday at the opening ceremony I had to take pictures after working all day at the US pilgrim office and so coupled with Wednesday's work, I got to my room at 3 and crashed for the rest of the day. it worked, because the headache that I had been sporting for the previous days had gone, when I woke up on Thursday.

The downside to all this is that I am away from my wife and baby girl, who is growing by the hour. She recognizes my voice on the phone which sort of makes up.
Okay so that was wednesday. Oh! on Wednesday i watched Spy Game, for $11.99 Canadian. I was truly satisfied. It is not often that you can watch an intelligent, action, drama movie that is well written, directed, acted, etc. I recommend it highly, 4 out of 5 stars.

Okay, that was wednesday. I have to go but I'll probably have more to say today about my Thursday and Today. Peace