A week with a difference

What a shot!  Or so I thought.  This was the shot of my week.  I posted it on Facebook with other shots, highlighting my Sunday with a difference at the cathedral for this was the Sunday directly following the King of Thailand's death.  So, on this Sunday, the faithful gathered with their cardinal to offer mass and prayers for their beloved King and father of the nation who had died only the Thursday before.   

While there was so much around me on the day - pomp and circumstance, a cardinal and clergy in their finery, many people thronging, all sorts of activity, including media - it was this simple, somewhat obtuse scene that really caught my eye.  What does it show, one may ask?  It is what the servers at mass came up with to keep the flame going at full blast for the fire used to heat the coals that were to ignite the incense.

What was it that struck me? 
Smart but simple, I say.  It was not an every day sight.  Rather it was a shot of basic reality within so much other worldly happenings.   It was a way of being practical and creative within a formal ecclesiastical setting.  While there is a great love here for ceremony and hierarchy, this shows that everyday realities still have to be met no matter what.  This is a down to earth, hands on initiative in the midst of all the other. 

Ones may be caught up in highly sacred activity and in heart wrenching life events but they have to remain rooted on the ground.  That is life.  Whatever is happening around us, whatever the chaos, whatever the nature of the life event being played out, life has to remain rooted and in touch with reality so that life goes on.  This one shot highlighted this for me a week within a week with a difference following the death of the King