A pilgrim in Prague

     I didn't take any pictures today...  I hoped to take a couple from the train, of this incredible cathedral castle in Esztergom that I have failed to snap in time on both previous trips past it, but today was cloudy and rainy.  And either some of those raindrops were floating around or there was some snow mixed in...
   But over last few days I have been doing a lot of both the above:  Taking pictures and riding trains.  Monday in particular—Daniel and I got up early and rode 40 minutes on trolleys and buses to the train station, then 4-plus hours to Prague,  where I took 80 pictures (don't know how many Daniel took), then a 5-plus hour ride back (there was a stalled train blocking our tracks) with 30 minutes of trolleys and buses.  We arrived in Prague at lunchtime and were able to meet up with Ted Turnau, one of the new friends I made in Eger who is a missionary/professor in Prague (small world syndrome--one of the churches that supports him is in my neighborhood in Cambridge--CTK for you MIT readers).

     Prague is a beautiful city but it has been discovered by the tourists and those who hope to profit from them.  We did find one island of serenity there—one that I enjoyed even as I was a little sorry so few others were interested in it.  There is in Prague a place called the Bethlehem Chapel, where Jan Hus preached to standing-room-only crowds of 3,000 people at a time.  Hus ministry here preceded Martin Luther by more than a hundred years, but Luther acknowledged him as one of his spiritual forbears.  In 1415 Hus was summoned by the Holy Roman Emperor to a church council in Constance, Switzerland.  He was 'guaranteed' safe passage, then turned over to church courts, convicted, and burned at the stake as a heretic.  Among his heresies were teaching that the true church was the community of believers and not the hierarchy, and his call for ending the greed and corruption of the clergy.  One of his famous quotes:  “One pays for confession, for mass, for the sacrament, for indulgences, for churching a woman, for a blessing, for burials, for funeral services and prayers. The very last penny which an old woman has hidden in her bundle for fear of thieves or robbery will not be saved. The villainous priest will grab it.”
    Anyway, Daniel and I had the Bethlehem Chapel to ourselves, and it was one of the pilgrimage stops on my sabbatical.  I'm attaching contrasting pictures—the mass of tourists at Charles Bridge and the quiet solitude in Bethlehem Chapel.
    Tonight I am in Budapest again, with a long flight to New York tomorrow...