It's Like Home Away From Home Away From Home

Since classes in Rome don’t start up until early October, the name of the game for the new man class at the NAC is to learn Italian.  This is important not only because we will be spending most of our next five years in Italy, but, for many of us, our classroom lectures will be in Italian as well!  And if there’s one thing that’s more daunting than trying to learn about the Trinity, it’s trying to learn about the Trinity in a foreign language.  So Italian studies, it is! 

Of the three summer Italian programs offered by the NAC, the Archdiocese has sent me to Siena, a beautiful Tuscan town of roughly 50,000 people, made famous by one of the influential and inspiring saints in the history of the Church, St. Catherine of Siena.  The month-long Italian program is pretty rigorous, offering 4 hours of classroom lecture and an hour and a half of private tutoring every day, and a host family who keeps me on my Italian toes at pretty much every waking hour.

I have been living with Viviano and Angela Ogheri, an elderly couple who own a small condo just west of the old town of Siena.  They don’t have any kids, but they have welcomed me very lovingly into their family, which means that for the first time in my life (or at least since I was 3 and a half), I’m an only child!  I have been blessed to spend many hours on the porch with Viviano, chatting about everything from how bees pollinate plants to his previous life as a designer of typewriters, to his dislike of Benito Mussolini.  At 8 pm every night, we dish up Angela’s special Tuscan pasta, turn on the TV to the local news, and let the Chianti flow.  Since Angela usually sticks to a salad, and Viviano doesn’t eat much, I usually have no choice but to eat everything on the table, while my Italian mother repeatedly exhorts me “Mangia! Mangia!” (“Eat! Eat!”) I haven’t looked at a scale in a while, but I think the immersion is working wonders!

Cookies and coffee for breakfast every morning!

During the day, we seminarians find plenty of time between classes to hang out, enjoy the city, and pray at Siena’s various beautiful churches.  It really is a blessing to have so many options for daily Mass, and so many beautiful places to say a prayer throughout the day!  One small grace occurred last Monday, my first day in Siena, when I went to a small church called San Martino for an evening Mass after class.  I was about half an hour early, and stumbled upon a small group of ladies praying the Rosary before Mass.  One of the women invited me to join them, and even offered me an Italian booklet explaining the Rosary and containing all the prayers in Italian!  Before long, I was able to follow along with them by memory, which was pretty awesome!  It has also been cool to slowly re-learn the Mass responses, many of which I still remembered from my semester in Rome.  We seminarians have even been blessed by the presence of an American Dominican priest named Fr. Alfred, who has been teaching us a bit about the Church in Italy.  Fr. Alfred has explained to us how, despite the rich tradition of her great saints, the witness of her martyrs, and the proximity of the Papacy, the Church in most Italian cities is truly suffering, and Siena is no exception.  The city’s beautiful Duomo is unfortunately full of tourists at all times of the day.  Many of them pay a few Euro to get in, take their pictures, and go on with their day.  While it certainly is great that there are so many people visiting a beautiful church, it’s also sad that this church is seen as merely another museum.  We need to pray ardently for renewal and fervor in the Church here in Italy.  Hopefully, the witness of a few American seminarians will be a grace for Siena!

Since we are free on the weekends, I had the grace of spending two nights in the beautiful city of Florence with 3 of my brother seminarians who are also living here in Siena.  It was a wonderful weekend of prayer, fraternity, and art!  On Saturday, we attended Mass in the Duomo’s famous Baptistry, which features an incredible mosaic dome of the Last Judgment.  Let’s just say you knew what you were getting yourself into when you were getting baptized in there!  After Mass, we had a chance to visit with the 4-foot tall, 84-year old priest, who left us with some very inspiring words: “The priesthood . . . It’s all about Christ.  It’s all about Christ!”

On Saturday, we saw the Academia Museum, and on Sunday, the Uffizi.  It was certainly the most art I’ve ever seen in my life, and probably the first time I’ve walked through an art museum of my own volition.  But both tours were absolutely incredible!  Michelangelo’s David was taller and more stunning than I had expected, and I just don’t think I can possibly fathom how anyone could make it with their own hands.  The sheer beauty of the rest of the art was quite overwhelming, and I may possibly be desensitized to seeing images of Jesus crowning His Blessed Mother (it seemed like that was the subject of half the pieces).  However, one thing that I will always find inspiring is the fact that history’s greatest works of art were commissioned for the purpose of drawing hearts and minds to God.  Whether it was an image of the Annunciation, or a depiction of the Massacre of the Innocents, every piece of art told the story of salvation!

Well, week 2 of 4 in Siena is fully underway!  The 17 of us here is Siena have been blessed by the arrival of Fr. Gaffney, a NAC spiritual director from Rhode Island who will be spending the week with us, as well as offering Mass and hearing confessions.  I don’t feel quite ready yet to confess my sins in Italian, so I’m pretty glad he’s here!  It will also be great to have Mass together as a seminarian community, since we were mostly spread throughout the city during our first week.  Please prega per noi (pray for us) and for all the NAC men studying Italian this month; Lord knows we need it!  Please be assured of mine as well.

In Christ,

Colin

Ty Sanders, Greg Parent, John LoCoco, and myself in Florence!

Brothers and Sisters,

First of all, welcome! I hope that this blog will be an opportunity to share with you some of the many graces and adventures which the Lord will certainly have in store throughout my next 5 years in Rome. I am so grateful for all of the prayers and support I have received throughout my first 4 years of seminary and which have already continued as I move on to theological studies at the North American College. Please keep those prayers coming! It is my hope that this blog will allow many of my family, friends, and benefactors to see what I'm up to in the Eternal City and beyond.  Please also know that you all are in my prayers as well!

On Sunday, July 13th, I flew from MSP airport to Newark International, just outside New York.  This was the meeting place for 39 of the 55 new men at the North American College, as we all prepared to depart for Fiumicino Airport in Rome.  It was pretty awesome getting there early, and watching as these 39 men slowly assembled together in the terminal.  Imagine a sea of joyful guys in polos and khakis holding breviaries, praying together, and talking about each others' home diocese.  That's pretty much how it went!

We arrived in Rome the next day, July 14th, which seems like an eternity ago.  We were welcomed to our new home by about a dozen second-year men, all of whom have been incredibly generous to us this week in helping us to get settled and making our transition to the NAC a blessed one.  Our first day in Rome consisted of a trip to none other than St. Peter's Basilica.  One of the priests on staff explained to us some of the beautiful images of the square and the facade, before leaving us with the inspiring challenge to "never let this church get old." He was certainly right.  Over the past week, this advice has been echoed by almost every one of the older men.

In the days since our arrival, we have been blessed to be able to jump right into the NAC life (minus some pretty important things, like class).  In keeping with the general custom of the Italians, the seminarians here spend the morning out and about the city.  During a normal day in a semester, this would consist of classes.  However, for us, mornings have been chock-full of wonderful excursions to various holy sites in the city!  On Tuesday, we visited the catacombs of St. Callixtus, which are the largest of the many catacombs locations in Rome.  While there, we also had the blessing of having Mass in a small room which at one time would have housed the remains of dozens of martyrs!  Our tour guide, a rotund, eccentric Frenchman, explained to us that while many nowadays might see the catacombs as a place of death, the Christians thought of them as completely the opposite: they were places of life, because that was where the body waited to be reunited with the glorified soul!  I can certainly understand what he meant, because the catacombs left me not with a feeling of eeriness, but rather with a great peace.  The faith of the first Christians was certainly a powerful force in the early days of Christianity, and still continues to be.

On Wednesday, we received a beautiful tour of the Basilica of St. John Lateran from an incredibly holy Scottish nun named Sister Emmanuela.  As an opportunity for evangelization, she gives tours of the major basilicas to tourists and pilgrims alike, and her love for the Church and devotion to these beautiful buildings became evident from the get-go.  Before even entering the basilica, Sister showed us how the beautiful statues atop the church's facade serve to draw pilgrims up to heaven by showing us the images of the saints in the background of their heavenly glory!

Christ stands in the middle, with the Fathers of the East and West on either side

Once inside, we saw that this theme of paradise remained the focus.  The statues of the apostles and images of salvation history prepare us for only one thing: the sacrifice of the Mass!  Sure enough, at the end of the nave, we encountered the breathtaking baldechino, the large structure covering Papal altar, which is only used by the Holy Father.  The Lateran was certainly incredible!  And I suppose that makes sense, since it is the Pope's Cathedral, and the home parish of every Catholic in the world!

The baldechino at the Lateran!

(Fun Fact: If you're wondering who St. John Lateran is, this is a very good thing to be wondering.  Actually, there is no St. John Lateran.  The basilica is dedicated to two other real St. John's, namely, St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist.  The name "Lateran" comes from the name of the family that owned the land which the Emperor Constantine bought to build the church.)

On Thursday, we visited the small Umbrian town of Orvieto, which is roughly an hour-and-a-half bus ride from Rome.  It was wonderful to get out of the crowded city for a bit and see the beautiful Italian countryside.  The old town is set atop a large cliff, and the medieval walls and gates are still mostly intact, giving the town a really cool, medieval feel.  I sure as heck wouldn't want to attack it.  Anyway, our main destination was Orvieto's beautiful Duomo (another word for Cathedral church, I think?), which, in addition to being an amazing structure in its own right, actually houses the first ever documented Eucharistic miracle!

The story of the miracle is actually really cool.  In 1263, a priest was celebrating Mass in the Duomo, and was experiencing some doubts about the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist.  As he was elevating the host, blood began to drip out and land on the corporal on the altar!  Since nobody really knew what to do, he figured he would go tell the Pope.  Like everybody else, Pope Urban IV was blown away, and immediately set about trying to increase the Church's devotion to the Body and Blood of Our Lord in the Eucharist.  The result?  The feast of Corpus Christi, which has been celebrated in the Church every year since 1264!  Another result, the commissioning of St. Thomas Aquinas to write the prayers and hymns for the Mass, most of which we still use today!  In fact, we had the beautiful grace of having Mass in the very chapel in which the corporal is still held, and, during Mass, we sang two of St. Thomas' most beautiful hymns, Adoro Te Devote, and Pange Lingua.  It was simply one of the most beautiful experiences of my life.  I thank the Lord that I was able to experience this deep encounter with him in the Eucharist!

The last two days have taken us to the Basilicas of San Clemente and St. Paul Outside the Walls, two of the most remarkable churches in Rome (and that really is saying something!).  Since I realize that this post has been very long and since I should probably sleep, I won't go into all the wonderful details now, especially since I'm looking forward to spending more time at both of those places soon.  For now, please know that my prayer at St. Paul's was especially directed toward all those back home who have been praying for me and supporting me throughout my life and throughout my journey!  I prayed also in a special way for my beloved Archdiocese of St. Paul & Minneapolis, whose inspiring patron is buried just beneath the altar.  I love that basilica so incredibly much, just as I love my beautiful Archdiocese and all the people there.

Well, after spending a week adjusting to Rome, they're kicking me out!  I will be spending my next four weeks in the town of Siena, living with an Italian couple, taking some Italian classes, speaking with an Italian tutor, and for all intents and purposes drowning in the sea of "alora" and "va bene." I'm really looking forward to it, though, and I will be joined by 16 of my new brothers who will be there to support me, pray for me, and maybe toss in some English encouragement every once in a while.  I'm not sure how often I will be able to write there, but until next time, pregate per me (pray for me)!

In Christ,
Colin

P.S. You can email any prayer requests you may have to me at colinator01@gmail.com.  I would love to intercede for you and your loved ones!