I woke up this morning and I was in my own bed.
It still feels amazing even after over a week of being back home.
I feel its only fair to mention that I didn’t fall off my bike. What Dom saw was a complex illusion created by the refraction of light inside his sun glasses multiple times. In actuality, I was so genuinely pleased to see English ground again I gave it a hug. It was an enthusiastic hug and to the casual observer it may, I suppose, have looked like I had fallen off of my bike. The mistake is of course entirely understandable.
Looking back over the photo’s now I already get a nostalgic glow, a warmth which is all the more tangible for knowing that we really did recieve many many graces on our adventure. Without such intercession we’d still be sweating it out somewhere in Europe. (Indeed, with my unerring sense of direction, we’d probably both be somewhere on the trans-Siberian train route, except for Our Ladys help and Doms mastery of the AA Travellers Guide Map of Europe).
To that end we are both unable to fully thank those of you who gave us the charity of your prayers. You all remain very much in our thoughts and prayers. In one last plea we both beg you to donate as best you can to Youth 2000.
The Walsingham retreat itself is coming up fast with less than two weeks to go now. That means that eighty thousand pounds needs to be found fast. In the words of Fr. John Edwards (said some years ago),
‘There must be something very special about a ‘Youth Movement’ which in post-Christian Britain has in less than ten years produced 35 religious vocations, 12 vocations to lay communities and 15 marriages.’
Once more, we ask for your prayers and charity in equal measures of generosity for the retreat and for all those who will be making their pilgrimage there in two or so weeks from all over England, Scotland and Wales, not to mention from many parts of Europe.
Thank you and God bless you,
Phil and Dom