Churches in Washington

We hear about a Catholic Basilica that we think we should check out.  It is called the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.  Long name and a huge church and so incredibly beautiful.

                                            THE BASILICA OF THE SHRINE OF THE
                                                    IMMACULATE  CONCEPTION

                                          The mosaic of Christ and the Baldachin Altar

INSIDE THE CHURCH

We take public transport to get there and need help from a very helpful young woman in the subway.  We take the subway to the NE section of town.  We continue to see signs with the initials CUA.   Takes a minute or two to realize this stands for "Catholic University of America".  The buildings are old and beautiful and look like castles.  We see the dome and think we must be in the right place.

We are unable, at this time, to go into the Upper Church as there was a funeral in progress.  We join a tour in the Crypt Church and Lower Level where Mass is celebrated every day.  There are numerous chapels here and many statues.   The tour is very informative.  After the tour we head to the book store and cafeteria.  We have a bite of lunch by which time the funeral is over and we are able to visit the Upper Church.   We are told by our tour guide that the funeral is for a young man in the US Military who died in Afghanistan.  I find a program from the funeral and discover his name was Brendan Looney and he was 29 years old.  4000 people attended his funeral.  My son is 26 years old and this really hits home to me.   I mention his name because I feel I should  honor him and this is the only way I know how,  and to never forget these young men and women.
The Upper Church is nothing short of amazing.  For those of you who might be interested I suggest looking at the website - www.nationalshrine.com



When we finish at the Shrine we decide we may as well stay on the Church theme.  In my Washington, DC  book they talk about the Washington National Cathedral,  also known as The Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul.  It is an Episcopalian Gothic cathedral.  It is the 6th largest cathedral in the world. It is huge.   This cathedral has a stained glass window known as the Space window commemorating mankind's achievement in science and technology.  There is a piece of moon rock in this window.

                                             WASHINGTON NATIONAL CATHEDRAL

                                                          INSIDE THE CATHEDRAL

                                                          THE SPACE WINDOW



Now that we are churched out we head home on the bus.  As it is not raining we decide to take the last tour left on our "hop on hop off" bus ticket, the night tour.  We pick up a couple of sandwiches from the food court in Union Station and "hop on" the bus.  It departs at 6.30 pm and lasts about an hour and a half.  It is lovely to see Washington's buildings and monuments lit up.  The most spectacular was the Lincoln Memorial - we are a little to far from it but is looked amazing.

                                         Lincoln Memorial way in the distance with the
                                             World War 2 memorial in the foreground.


We head home - frozen - the wind really picked up tonight but very happy with our accomplishments today.

Talk to you tomorrow