The Netherlands

[mahalia]

Maybe this is a silly question, but I’m going to ask it anyway

I got a student exchange in The Netherlands for next year. I know it’s a country with a very small catholic community.
I get to choose between Rotterdam, Utrecht, Maastricht, Leiden and Nijmegen. I want to choose the city where there is a good catholic community, where I can go to daily mass.
So, if anyone here has something to say, please do

 

[Allan_M]

Hi there I have lived in Holland for about 7 years now, I have lived in both Rotterdam and Utrecht, in Utrecht you can have daily mass in Utrecht city center. In the south of the country the majority of people are catholic ( Iwas shocked at this fact). Be prepared though (if you come to the center of the land) daily mass is almost forgotten attendance is poor but the service is there, Sunday attendance (in the Dutch service) is little below normal, however the mass for the English speakers here has a good mixed crowd Africans, Brits, Scotts, Phillipinos, Indians, Irianians,and some Dutch come also for a more orthodox homily and service. The Latin service is also available on Sundays in the city center of Utrecht but the readings and homily in Dutch. A bit of advice if I may…if you are coming here to be a student living with other students and doing student things stay away from Amsterdam…It is a beutiful city but it is a wash with shamlessness and sin… Good luck to you with you’re visit and with you’re studies.

 

[mahalia]

Thanks!

 

[phil8888]

I lived in the Netherlands for 4 months. I was lucky to find a good Catholic community of young people in Delft. We had an English mass every Sunday. I was very homesick and felt very terrible. I couldn’t eat or do anything. I longed to go home. I met a great priest named Fr. Engelbertink. He took care of all the student programs at Church. He was awesome.

Over the first couple of days, it was very very terrible. I was very upset and it was extremely hard on me. I sought out a church. I walked for a while adn eventually found a church that was open. I discovered that it was Catholic with Franciscans there. One priest, or seminarian I believe, talked to me extensively.

I can truly say that the church that I found and the people there sustained me while I lived in the Netherlands.