Three days with the Pope

The last three days were a whirlwind, and unfortunately we were not able to post. On Friday we all went to a catechesis session led by the popular Archishop Dolan of New York. He gave the best catechesis of the week and was realy able to meet us where we were at and draw us closer to Christ from there. He also had some very memorable jokes which had all of us, including our Archbishop, laughing and enjoying the morning. That evening, many of us headed off to get a spot to watch the Stations of the Cross presided over by the Holy Father. Many of us ended up not actually seeing the Stations firsthand but instead watched it on a big screen just outside the venue. Some did actually brave the crowd and go in and one of our seminarians even managed to work his way on stage with all the bishops and the Holy Father. The stations themselves were very well done and were accompanied with music that really lifted up the soul into the mystery of Christ's suffering.

Saturday was a very eventful and memorable day for us. The seminarians started the day off early at 6 am to head down to the Cathedral of Madrid for a seminarian Mass with the Holy Father. As we traveled there, we were amazed to see partiers finishing up their night/morning. 5 of our crew of 22 seminarians got into the Cathedral while the rest watched from a piazza out in front of the Cathedral. The Mass was very beautiful and very prayerful. We are not sure what he said but it sounded good and we all look forward to getting back and reading his homily. The most exciting part was at the end of the Mass where he declared a new Doctor of the Church, which has only happened 34 times now in the history of the Church. We all look forward to getting to know this new Doctor more.

That evening we made the famous pilgrimage journey to the final Mass site. The trains to it were so packed that we didn't need to hold onto anything because there was no way we could fall. The day was very hot too and we were all praying for some clouds or even rain but we in no way expected what would come later that evening. Our section ended up being full and so we ended up camping out in a section which seemed like it was a mile away from the main stage. All was going realively well in the massive crowd as the Holy Father came and started a prayer vigil, when off in the distance a storm cloud began brewing amd headed towards us. We thought it might pass us but then all of a sudden tremendous winds ripped through the crowd of over a million people followed by rain. It also got quite cold. Everything stopped and people began fleeing as the "hurricane" rolled through, but we all managed to survive unscathed. After that rain stopped, the prayer vigil continued and then finished. It is an unbelievable sight to see one million people kneeling in adoration with the Pope and hundreds of bishops.

We all slept relatively well that night and got to wake up to see the damage from the storm. Then we had a beautiful Mass with the Holy Father and then made the long journey home. It was truly a wonderful and very eventful few days with the Pope.

We are now packing up our gym floor and heading off to Fatima, and then tomorrow we will fly back to the States. Pray we have a safe journey to Portugal and then back home.