Back from Portsmouth

I took this photo on the beach at Bembridge this morning during a short walk after breakfast. Yesterday, I travelled to the Isle of Wight to say Mass at St Mary's, Ryde. Afterwards, thirteen of us went to a restaurant in Bembridge for a strictly fish meal and a good chinwag. The Latin Mass Society is thriving on the Island and the members are fully involved in their parish.

This morning, after breakfast and my beach walk, I crossed the Solent with a number of LMS members to go to St John's Cathedral, Portsmouth to give a Day of Recollection for the Portsmouth Latin Mass Society. It was a pleasant inconvenience for the organisers to have to put out more chairs in the Hall because the numbers were greater than expected. I spoke about the sacrifice of Christ, the sacrifice of the Mass and our participation in the Mass. (Sorry - I was speaking for various notes and do not have a text to post.)

The Cathedral is well kept and vastly improved from what I remember from my visit in the late 1970s. I was pleased to meet the Cathedral Dean, Canon David Hopgood, who was a few years ahead of me at Wonersh when I started there in 1976.

The journey back was not too bad. I just missed the worst of the fall-out from the Portsmouth-Villa game and managed to catch up with the breviary on the way home.

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