"My heart is close to all of you"

...says Pope Benedict XVI to every person living in the United States of America in an unprecedented video in advance of his Apostolic Journey to the United States of American and to the United Nations Organization Headquarters next week.

As the Holy Father continues his preparations for the journey, so I continue my own preparations.

Yesterday Bishop Lucas very kindly delivered my ticket to the Papal Mass in Washington, D.C. before the meeting of the Priests Personnel Board. As might be expected, I was a bit distracted for the first part of the meeting.

The meeting went very well and moved along at a good pace, with a break for a nice meal together, as is our custom.

After the meeting I was visiting with the priests at the Cathedral, as is my custom. The pastor of the Cathedral parish is a son of my home parish, being just a few years older than I. As we talked they told me that His Emminence Francis Cardinal George would be arriving later in the afternoon for dinner before he meets with a few legislators today. I decided to hang around and greet the Cardinal and then return to Effingham, after a bit of shopping. I ended up staying for dinner and had a delightful time!

His Emminence spoke in his usual frank and humorous manner about topics ranging from next week's papal visit, the Holy Name Cathedral, the media, India, Australia, and a few others that I cannot now recall.

After dinner I went out to look at digital cameras. The one I currently have has only a 3x optical zoom and I wanted one with greater zoom capabilities but that would still fit in my pocket. I found one and for not much more than I expected to spend.

The camera I bought is an Olympus (I think) with 10 megapixels and a 7x optical zoom. One particular feature sold me on this camera: "burst" mode, in which the camera will take a series of pictures so long as you hold down the button! Now I'll be able to take a series of pictures - like a cartoon flip book - of the Holy Father moving in procession! I'll try to play with it sometime today to give you an example of what it can do.

I'm off for Mass.