I am a great admirer of the French photographer Robert Doisneau whose photographs of Paris captured the spirit of the times in which his photos were taken. I used to have copies of Doisneau's work in my classroom when I was teaching and I have several books of his work.
This afternoon when I came out of church on a beautiful spring day and the faithful were gathered outside chatting I was reminded of two photos taken by Doisneau in Paris in 1945. The first is entitled Les bien-pensantes and the second Sortie de messe à Sceaux. (Sceaux is a suburb of Paris.) The difference between the photos in 1945 and the scene outside St. Joseph's in Bradford today was that there were many children and my heart felt as warm as the lunchtime sunshine.
After the Consecration of the wine today a child squealed as two others were giving their father the runaround. As our eldest daughter sat beside me with her two children and due to give birth to her third child any day now my heart rejoiced.
A young Polish couple were waiting at the sacristy door after Mass with details of their beautiful little son, Aleksander, who is to be baptised in a couple of weeks.
Deo gratias!
(Photos from Jean-Claude Gautrand's Icon book published by TASCHEN)
Reminder that we have two Corpus Christi Masses : Wednesday at St Winefride's at 6.00 p.m. and on Thursday at Clayton, St. Anthony's, at 9.30 a.m.