Friday 4 October
A very happy feast of St Francis to one and all! The pilgrimage is drawing to a close, only one more big visiting day and then a final day to visit sanctuaries and pack then the worst bit of all, the 3.00 am start for Rome! Ah well, it is not a package tour!!
Yesterday we went to the leper places, travelling amid a raging thunderstorm with lightening and rolling crashes of thunder, down to San Rufinuccio who was a small boy martyred for refusing to lie, and is buried here in one of the former leper places. There we had Mass and then went round to one of my favourite places, La Maddalena, the Magdalen chapel which had formerly been the chapel of the women lepers in Clare's time and where it seems each year more accepted that she and the sisters came to work with the lepers here. There was an added dimension this year in that some of the Franciscan Missionaries of the Divine Motherhood had worked in leper colonies and leper hospitals so it all had great relevance for them.
Then we went on to Rivo Torto, the storm was dying down by now but for the first time in all these years the stream was rushing with water, i have never seen this before, due to all the earlier rain. It was still raining actually and not only that but there was Mass in the church, a cardinal preaching. This not only meant we could not come out of the rain but had no place for the talk on fraternitas which is important because it sets the pattern of real relationships within the brothers and sisters and a change from the more monastic 'being alone with God'. So we hopped in the taxis and went back to the Casa and had the talk in comfort in the conference room. This was better than sitting in discomfort on the wall at Rivotorto and we should have done it years ago! Too late now to get good ideas! At one point we thought we would collect these ideas and hand them on the the next team (not yet fully chosen) but decided to spare them as they will do it their own way anyhow and quite rightly.
At 3.30 we had a ritual of the Transitus of Francis, beautifully done and very moving and closing with the traditional cakes which Lady Jacoba brought for him. Then the energetic went off the the Porziuncola for the main Transitus and, miraculously, got ringside seats and saw and heard everything and came back blessed to the eyeballs and high as kites.
We had another farewell dinner given in Murray's honour. Regular readers of this blog will know that we usually go out-to the home of Marcello the taxi driver (now retired) and his wife Marissa who cooks here at Casa P Giovanni, and their son Massimo who now runs the taxi firm, his Czech wife Nadia and their son Alessandro, also Marina the daughter, husband Paolo and two sons Andrea and Pietro, who was asleep upstairs. He must be four or five by now I think. As last year, Marissa made a traditional polenta for Murray with-a delicious sauce and chunks of their home made sausages and salami etc etc sitting on top.
He was not required to eat it all himself but had lots of help and the non meat eaters had a delicious pasta after several anti pasti, including some peppers stuffed with olive and anchovy which was out of this world. These were home made but if I see some at the fair tomorrow I will try and bring them back.
And so to bed, eventually, driving back through the dark and it had become very cold and via S Paolo was like a wind tunnel with a north wind whistling down it. I was very snug in my new shoes. I may not have mentioned that the walking shoes I had bought nearly killed me in St Peter's and left me with three black toes and a blood blister. So I gave them to Simona, the woman running Oasi and wore an unsuitable pair of slip ons I had picked up for nothing in the supermarket which clearly would not do. So one day here I, and two of the pilgrims, went out in a taxi to Bastia to a shop called Scarpe e Scarpe, Shoes and Shoes, which turned out to be the truth. It was as big as a supermarket and full of boxes of shoes! Every size, colour, shape and style! My two companions took charge of my Poor Clare ignorance about shoes, we were there for hours, I tried on at least eight pairs and every time I said they were comfortable they made me walk up and down for two minutes minimum to see. Finally this paid off, I bought a very nice pair, a sort of dark grey, the most comfortable shoes I have ever had in my discalced life. I am thinking of never taking them off but regarding them as two little dark grey hooves. Better still, they were labelled vegan ie no animal fabrics. And were less than the price I had mentally set as a limit. Also my tutors approved and so finally we came back rejoicing and I feel like a little donkey putting on my comfortable hooves every morning, then being so comfortable I dont think about them again until evening.
I am trying to think what I have not recorded, and I know the moving day at la Verna was part of it. We went there on 1 October, the weather held and an energetic group climbed to the top of the mountain. It was a funny visit in some ways in that half the chapels were shut and locked and the whole place seemed shut down for winter. So we had things in unusual places but God made it work. The group is very flexible and nobody grumbled or moaned at all! the pic is the outside of the basilica high on the mountain top. Then in the bus on the way home I read Francis' farewell to the mountain, just managing to get through in one piece as for we three it is also the last time. Shorter pilgrimages dont come here as it is a hole day trip. For some reason the Americans get all romantic about the English accent with this reading but at least I held it together!
I will try and send this off now, not sure about pics. If you get two in the blog then You will know it worked!
Love to all ft
I did not work. I will send pics separately
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