The First Week: Exploration Project

Why am I here? It is a question out of curiosity I heard on my first day in Rome. The implication is that one may seek status and certain air of ambitious aspirations envelope the spirit. People told me it before I left Chicago. Some like to play prophets foretelling my future not as a pastor. It looks like someone coming to Rome for studies is climbing steps on the ladder of the church. What ladder? I am a priest of Jesus Christ and that is the only and major achievement of my life. I am well content with that. So, I laid it down on the table right away. My only ambition and true aspiration is to become a saint! If God wants me to achieve it through and with Canon law, let it be. Therefore, I will make sure all the trials I will endure, I will carry them as a sacrifice for the people of the Archdiocese of Chicago and for my own sanctification. What a better project to carry on!

This first week has been one of exploration. After two uneventful flights that brought me here, the first challenge of speaking in Italian to a cab driver was overcome easily. Fr. Roberth and I reached our final destination for the set price. However, things started to get interesting once we were at front of the building of our future domicile. We followed all the directions given and no body answer the gigantic wooden door. We waited for 30 minutes or so; but Diego the explorer has to go. The exploration project began by going around the block looking for other doors. But that first try was unsuccessful. I came back to where we were and stayed there. Fr. Roberth went the other way around and after a little while I heard sounds from the other side of the door. To my surprise, Fr. Roberth opened the door! He got in through a side entrance that was left open. I don’t think he broke into the house, he just felt in home right away. Well, the Lord said: “knock and the door will be opened to you.” But what is better is that it is opened by a familiar face.
It was around 4:00 pm and our bodies couldn’t stand straight with alert and open eyes. There hadn’t been much sleep. Crossing the Atlantic eastbound gives you a too short night. But we shouldn’t go to bed at this point. We wanted to go to bed at Roman bed time. So we went to explore the neighborhood. Right coming out from the house there is the façade of the Gregorian University, my future school. It terrified me for a second. It is the oldest Jesuit University. Its beginnings date back to the year 1551. 23 Saints and 51 blessed of the Church had studied or taught here. Among those are Saint Roberto Bellarmino, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, and Saint Aloysius. Pope Benedict XVI also taught here back in the 70’s.

Going around the block we found the Fontana di Trevi. Obviously the little piazza was filled with tourists. I don’t know if I have to throw a coin there. I live in the neighborhood! It was built to mark one of the ends of the Roman aqueduct. I little further west, we saw the Pantheon, Piazza Novona and the ‘Gesu’ church. It is significant that in this one are the bodies of the Jesuit saints St Aloysius, St Roberto Bellarmino and the founder Saint Ignatius of Loyola, whose feast day is today, July 31st.

I think a good side project will be to compile pictures and reflections about the saints who are buried in Rome. There are many and many unknown. One of the questions I asked this week was about the number of Italian saints. What is it so special here to produce so many saints? What do we have to do in America to match it? We better articulate a convincing answer to it. Or maybe not. The answer is obvious and clear: an open, honest, and deep relationship with Christ. The question then is, how do we get it in the American culture?
Saint Ignatius of Loyola, pray for us!