TEWATTA,
Sri Lanka – All one thousand chairs set aside for the sick yesterday in the forecourt of our Lady of Lanka in Tewatta had an occupant. They were joined by thousands of pilgrims, 200 priests and 150 men and women religious, brought together at the national shrine for a solemn ceremony whose theme this year was ‘Reconcile and Heal Us, O Lord’. During his homily Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith of
Colombo, told the pilgrims that ‘Christians can smile through tears and tribulations’. He also urged the faithful to ‘live with inner balminess and righteousness’ whose absence led to ‘terror, arms and the blood bath in our country since 1970.’