A week-and-a-half after the devastating earthquake, the people of Port-au-Prince continue to gather to pray.

From AFP:

Hundreds of Haitians attended mass in the skeletal shadow of Port-au-Prince’s shattered Roman Catholic cathedral on Sunday, seeking to understand God’s hand in the apocalyptic earthquake.

Father Glanda Toussaint held the service at an altar improvised on a wooden table and told parishioners: “The earth can shake but the word of God continues.”

Before the January 12 quake, which killed over 112,000 people and devastated much of the impoverished Haitian capital, around 2,500 people would fill the pews for mass in the Notre Dame de l’Assomption Cathedral.

When Toussaint asked Sunday’s congregation of around 300 if they understood why the disaster happened, the crowd murmured their incomprehension.

“All is not the will of God but all is providential,” he said. “What we are going through is not finished, we must reconstruct the country and reconstruct our faith. As a Haitian, it hurts.”

The faithful sat on chairs, low walls and some on motorbikes, listening intently to their priest’s words.

“The parish was not destroyed, because you are here,” Toussaint said.

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