Encounters of Hope and Faith: A Journey Through a Cathedral

So I just met this lovely guy. He’s in a wheelchair. The reason he’s here is to not beg for money. He’s here because he’s hoping that people would pray for him. And he believes that if people pray for him, that he’ll be able to walk again. Look, they’ve got a ramp to get inside. How wonderful. Wow. You can actually buy candles. They’re €2 each and they’re really handy, especially in your hotel. If there’s any ever, ever a power outage. You just light it up and then you can see where you’re going. This is actually not for the hotel. So you can see if the power goes out, there’s actually an offering. So you light it and you put it here. It’s a really beautiful place. I feel really connected to the history and the culture. It feels authentic. And I haven’t even gone in the main area yet. It’s actually the main cathedral just behind me up this, of course, big flight of stairs. 2 million people visit the cathedral every year. And it’s actually two churches on top of each other. I’ve been told there’s a wheelchair entrance that’s on the side of the building, but there’s absolutely no signage or no instructions on how to get there. I have to leave the building, I think, somehow to see if I can find other entrance. So let’s see if we can find a way in. There’s three wheelchair accessible spaces right out the front. Look At that prime parking, just parked there and next thing you know, roll up to the staircase that you can’t get into. So I just met this lovely guy. He’s in a wheelchair and I had a bit of a chat with him in, with a translator in French. And the reason he’s here is to not beg for money. He’s here because he’s hoping that people would pray for him. And he believes that if people pray for him that he’ll be able to walk again and his condition will disappear. Uh, so just a little bit sad, but I did say to him, look, I hope the prayers work and hopefully you’ll one day be cured and walk again. I found the wheelchair accessible entrance road. I’m back. Wow. It is not wide. It will not fit a large power chair going up such a beautiful cathedral. And I did some praying. I prayed that my legs would work again and I also prayed that my mate out the front, his legs work again too. These things probably take a little bit of time, but if anything changes, I’ll let you know. My mate in the wheelchair that was sitting there, he’s no longer there anymore. So maybe the prayer worked and who knows, maybe he ran away. What goes up must come down. It’s deep. It’s deep. It’s deep. I made it down the hill safely, thank god. I don’t know. Maybe these little rosary beads did Help me. After all, that’s the bike lane for going up. As they say, it’s all downhill from here.