Catholic in faith, catholic in taste

Got a bit of a sore throat today, didn't sleep well, and feeling sorry for myself. So I thought it was time to post a couple of nice videos, from two very different aspects of the Church, both of which I love. The first was recorded on 12th May at Fatima, the shrine in Portugal. 13th May is the feast of Our Lady of Fatima, marking the first apparition there in 1917, when Our Lady appeared to three children, an apparition repeated each month until October. So the 13th of each month is the big day in Fatima.

Celebrations start the evening before, when the statue is processed from its shrine chapel across the huge piazza to an outdoor altar, where it remains all night during a vigil, through to a great Mass in the morning, at the end of which it is processed back to its chapel amid great emotion. The video shows the torchlight procession of the first evening. It's not "dramatic", just an image of the faith of 300,000 Catholics in God and Our Lady - with the singing of the Fatima hymn and thousands of candles held high, let it sort of wash over you. It's got a commentary in Portuguese, but don't let that put you off. If you haven't been to one of the great shrines, this will give you a taster... I found it on the blog of Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston, who leads the procession.

The second video is very different, and from the modern charismatic strand of the Church. It is a song written by someone called Paul Baloche, of whom I'd never heard before today. I found this song, called simply "Glorious" on a Salesian priest's blog.