In the morning, we attended the said mattins service at Christ Church, in a beautiful cathedral with large stained-glass windows and a beautiful text to read! Psalm 107. Incidentally, Christ Church is the place where they filmed the Great Hall scenes in Harry Potter (!!!!), and though it was closed when we went, still, WE WERE THERE.
Then we walked through Magdalen College, pronounced "Maudlin"(confusing), the college C.S. Lewis taught at. It was beautiful, even more so than everything else we've seen here, which is something. The gardens in the quad are incredible, full of different kinds and colors of flowers! We saw the building his office was in, and then we walked the same walk he would take. Although it is a tourist attraction, it was not crowded and the area had a very introspective but welcoming atmosphere about it, and, of course, I loved it.
walking on the path with the chapel spires in the background
Afterwards we went to tea! Which was delicious, very fun and quaint, but there were a LOT of us that went and I think we were a little overwhelming for the small restaurant. We went to the Old Parsonage hotel!
And we had vespers tonight! Which was amazing. As I wrote Bren:
It was incredible. We met in the small chapel next to our dorm, it had high, vaulted stone ceilings and red velvet cushions on the old dark wooden benches with beautiful tiles on the floors, and we sang! Our voices FILLED the chapel and echoed and it was beautiful, everybody came!! Then I got up, and i've really felt that our group needs to be open and candid with how we're doing with each other, so I started! I got in front of everyone and told what I was feeling (I'm not sure what God's purpose is for me on this trip...) and read them the verse that I had been praying through (Colossians 1:9-14--real good) and encouraged people that it is very important that they were on this trip and that God had good work to do in each of us! And then I invited other people to share whatever they were feeling... and they actually did! Girls AND guys! (which is important, because guys aren't really "sharers".) People sang at the top of their lungs, and prayed, and took communion, and afterwards they all said they loved it, were so refreshed! God is AWESOME. AH!
I love you!
I want my garden to look just like that...exactly! (even though we hardly ever get rain even once daily, much less twice). Thanks for posting the pictures!
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