Door to door in Whitechapel

Yesterday we did a Lenten mission for St. Anne's parish in Whitechapel where some of us live. The parish has a large Brazilian community there now, both the priests being Brazilian as well. Fr. Osvaldo asked us to go around to the houses of parishioners in the area and give them information about the Mass times and invite them to the parish particularly in this time of Lent (assuming that some of them do not come regularly already). Before going out Wadim, our team leader, suggested that if we were invited then we should go into the parishioners' houses and chat with them. Angela and Iwona objected, feeling it would be unsafe to do so, so we left it up to each pair. It turns out that hardly any of us got a chance to talk with the parishioners, except for Angela and Iwona, who got invited into the very first house they went to and talked to almost everyone whose house they visited! Susie, Wadim and I stopped in the London Buddhist Centre on our way to one of the houses to chat and we left a prayer card with them. Whitechapel is such a diverse area, with Victorian terraced housing a stone's throw away from very basic council flats. And of course there is a large Muslim community there. I think we have more in common with the Muslims than the Buddhists...