visiting Franciscans

Today, we celebrated St. Francis Day at St. James Church. A little early, but that's okay. Like many churches, we had a blessing of the animals. Our cat had the third blessing of her life. She loves going to church! She also joins my husband and me when we say our morning and evening prayers. A real religious cat. The church was bouncing with dogs of all shapes and sizes. Cats were in cages, for the most part. (Some daring children carried their kittens in their arms.) And for the first time, hopefully not the last, our church invited the Vancouver Police Department to bring their horses and dogs for a blessing. They actually showed up! We had four horses and one representative of the dog squad lined up on the street outside the church, and the priests went down and blessed each of them. The congregation watched from the church steps. After the blessing, the children of the church were invited to go down and pet the horses and police dog.
That wasn't the end of St. Francis celebrations. Our fellowship group had two visitors from England, who wanted to renew their vows while they were in Vancouver. So, we had a special Mass in the Lady Chapel for them. After that we had our fellowship meeting in the Bishops' Room, and some tea and cookies to keep us going. My son accompanied us to the Animal Blessing so he could take the cat home for us. We couldn't expect the poor little puss to stay in her cage for the whole afternoon!