From California to Cornwall

A Cornishman, parishioner at Lanherne, at the Sunday morning post-Mass breakfast. Him standing there with this sandwich seemed somehow to epitomize part of Cornwall. So I couldn't resist taking his photo and including it here!

Dear Friends and Family,

My apologies for this late blog! I had meant to write it Sunday night, after the day's apostolates, but then got two phone calls that needed tending to and then collapsed into bed.

Last week was full of blessings. I'll try to give you some of the highlights.

For starters, I completed my long-awaited exam on Tuesday! The exam-day experience itself was quite interesting: waiting outside the Pasadena Convention center with several hundred very nervous law students--the tension was so thick that you could have cut it with a knife. I was asked for a number of blessings that morning. The exam seemed to go well. I felt I was able to give it my best effort and to use the allotted time well. I won't receive the results until August 15th, but felt grateful for how the exam went.

Then Wednesday I was able to visit with the Tasins and Layfields, two young families from Texas whom it was truly wonderful to see again--God bless you both for giving me that gift! Then Wednesday evening I hopped on a plane for London and arrived Thursday afternoon.

In London I was able to visit the Tyburn Convent--the famous convent of sisters built on the site where many priests and laity suffered martyrdom for the Faith--some of them being hung, drawn, and quartered. Saint Edmund Campion was probably the most famous of the martyrs. It was good to be able to pray where they had suffered, and to ask for their intercession for us today. I also spent some time doing research for my doctorate at a library in London. It's a library that I will hopefully return to in the coming months.

Finally, Saturday, I arrived back in Lanherne. After so much travel it was truly, truly wonderful to arrive back at the quiet convent and to be able to begin resuming a regular rhythm of prayer, work, apostolate, and study. And that began with a Saturday evening dinner with many of the local parishioners at their farm. It was wonderful to have a chance to go around the table and hear how each of them were doing, and how the past two months had been.

Sunday morning began as usual at 4:30AM with prayer, and then 7AM Confessions, 7:30AM Mass, then breakfast with parishioners, then off to Plymouth for Confessions, Mass, and then visiting over refreshments. After Mass we had the "Churching of women" ceremony for a young mother who had just given birth to her first child. It was a short, simple ceremony, but a beautiful way to bless the mother as she begins this stage of her motherhood. Next Sunday will be the Baptism. Then, later in the afternoon, I went to visit someone who was sick, and was encouraged by their attitude in the midst of hard suffering.

I then drove back to Lanherne. I had every intention of writing you this blog in the evening, but between the jet-lag and the fact that I only slept 4 hours Saturday night (was up late finishing the sermon), and then the two phone calls I received, I fell asleep before my mind could remember to write the blog.

So it was a week full of blessings, and it feels very good to now be able to dive into a regular rhythm of prayer and work.

May Jesus and Mary watch over you and guide you.

In Cordibus Iesu et Mariae,
Fr. Pillari