Note: Blog entry originally started at the dinner before the Chrism mass, but finished the day after the Chrism mass.
I’m currently having a dinner at the Catholic school next to my diocese’s Cathedral, and after an hour (in accord with rules for receiving the Eucharist) I’ll be attending the annual Chrism mass.
Almost every Thursday, I wake up at six, —actually, I wake up at six everyday, but on most days I stay in bed and pray & read for a bit, to give myself some time to wake up.- take the bus to a neighbouring town, and walk a few Kilometers to attend a reverent parish, and Eucharistic Adoration there. (Yes! that's how far I'll go to attend a reverent mass, and Eucharistic Adoration!) However, I've also heard that my diocese's Cathedral also has Eucharistic Adoration every Thursday and on top of that, my diocese's Cathedral is also dedicated to Our Lady, specifically, it's dedicated to her under the title of Mary Immaculate. Being the huge devotee to Our Lady that I am, I have several books on Mary and Marian devotion, in one of them, I've read a part on Pilgrimages to Marian Shrines, and it suggested that if you don't have access to a Marian Shrine, you should instead travel to your nearest Church dedicated to Our Lady as a pilgrimage.
So my plan for this May, the Month of Mary, is instead of taking the bus to the more reverent parish for Adoration on Thusrdays, I'll instead take the bus to my Cathedral, the Cathedral of Mary Immaculate as a pilgrimage in honour of her, and her month. I've already had a bit of a practice run this (now last) evening when I took the bus all the way from my college to the Cathedral for the Chrism mass. It worked out quite well, the only difficulty was that I had to walk up a steep hill to get from the bus stop to the Cathedral, other than that, everything seems to work out okay, provided the bus schedules work. I look forward to May, my only concern with that month is that I'm worried my online semi-self-paced college course will interfere with it, but other than that, everything looks good. My Cathedral is quite beautiful, apart from the fact that the Tabernacle isn't centred, but maybe my new bishop will fix that, also my diocese's capital has some really good restaurants, so if my scheduling for the pilgrimage works out okay, maybe I can stay behind and enjoy some feasting. We'll just have to wait and see, but for now, things are looking quite optimistic.
Glory to God
and
Hail Mary!
and Mary Immaculate, pray for us!
-JesusLovesOurLady
