Church

I was trying to go in a chronological order for the sake of noncofusion but it is taking too long to catch up with the older posts. I have been here for 6 days now and am really in love with it. Just like everyone says, everyone is so friendly. I am having a good time, but as the title of my post says, it is about church. We have a great "Chapel" (I would call it a cathedral) on campus that is for the seminarians. It is not open to the students. I am sad that I do not have pictures of it but here is a very artistic picture that I found online. I have not been inside yet.

On Sundays at 9:30 there is a mass in St. Joseph's Oratory, which I have yet to find, as it is not on any map. There also is daily mass at St. Mary's Oratory, which also is not on any maps and we got directions, and wondered for a long time without finding it.

Everything in this town is named after St. Mary. There is the St. Mary's school for boys, the St. Mary's school for girls, the St. Mary's secondary school, and St. Mary's parish. I suppose they are all related, but I did not think so at first because they are not really close to one another. It is great at 3, when the primary school lets out and all the little ones come out and walk home in their really ugly uniforms. Somehow they are still very cute. The secondary school lets out at 4. They have just as ugly uniforms but they are bigger, so they cannot get away with being as cute. The skirts are calf length plaid skirts and extremely over sized zip up plain blue sweatshirts.

I went to mass at the parish church, St. Mary's, today. They have several masses on Sunday but I found myself at the "family" mass, which really means children's. I did not realize this before I went. It was entertaining, but I do not think I will go again. The music was terrible, because the children were singing off tune and we sang songs that had lines like "If I were an elephant, I would lift my trunk to you and thank you for my trunk." There were no people my age, just kids that were under 15 and parents and grandparents. The theme of the mass was being brave. There was even a cloth that said "Be Brave" in all different colors hanging from the alter. The priest talked about the lion in the Wizard of Oz and how he was brave. He asked for participation from the kids for what the characters were looking for when they got to Oz. They ran up and spoke into the mike. My favorite was:

Priest: What was the Scare Crow looking for?
Girl about 10: A brain
Priest: And why was the Scare Crow looking for a brain?
Girl: Because he is the Scare Crow.

Needless, to say, it was a slow mass but mostly familiar. There was no sign of peace, holding hands during the Our Father, or wine. After the priest said "mass is ended, go in peace to love and serve the Lord," everyone left. Now I know where my grandpa gets it.

A couple of days ago I went to adoration there because I was passing it and found that it was open for adoration.

I am interested to see who goes to mass here. At the pub the other night an Irish guy asked me if I am religious because I brought up abortion. Long story short, I found out that here I am considered extremely religious because I go to mass every Sunday. I have only met one girl who is not an atheist who is studying abroad, and she is some sort of very strict Lutheran who does not wear makeup and does not drink. She has 10 brothers and sisters. All the Irish say "Oh I'm Catholic, but I do not believe in God." Very interesting...I am going to try to go to some clubs like the Christian Union to see what is going on. Though, I might be poor later because it costs 2 euro to join any clubs or societies on campus.