Retreat

After a heartfelt goodbye to the great state of Illinois, I find myself back at St. John Vianney in beautiful St. Paul, MN.  Tomorrow, my class will be leaving for a 4 day silent retreat before we leave for Rome, so please keep us in your prayers.  While 4 days of silence does sound intimidating, I am very much looking forward to it.  It will be a great opportunity to enter into the presence of the Lord and prepare my heart for Rome.  As St. John of the Cross said, "Silence is the language of God."  So please pray that I may take the time to listen and just spend time with the Lord.  Be assured of my prayers for all of you.  

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe - Ruega por Nosotros!    

Soon and Very Soon

Well, it is 5 days until I leave for Minnesota and 10 days until I leave for Rome, so needless to say, the anticipation is definitely building.  And when I talk to people about Rome, I usually get 2 questions.  The first "Wow, are you excited?"  The second, "Do you know any Italian?"  And my usual response to the questions are Yes and No, respectively.  But to say that I am excited about Rome wouldn't really give you the full picture about how I'm feeling.  Am I looking forward to my time over there?  Absolutely.  But is it all excitement?  No.  For one thing, it is hard to be excited about something I don't know a whole lot about.  I've heard tons of great stories from people who have been there before, but I have never experienced anything like this.  So just the vast amount of unknown makes it hard to be very excited about the whole semester.  Also, as I am preparing for the semester, I am realizing that it will not be an easy, 4 month European vacation.  Living in a completely different culture, with people who do not speak my language, studying with some of the most important theologians in the Church, is pretty intimidating.  Also, there is the part of me that will miss the seminary community at SJV and my family and friends because I will not be able to come home at all.  I will be forced out of my comfort zone and into a completely different world.  

So when I start to put it like this, it sounds like I am not excited about Rome whatsoever.  But that is not the case at all.  It reminds me a lot of the feeling I had the summer before going to seminary.  I had no idea what I was getting myself into and I knew that it wouldn't be the easiest thing in the world, but I was very excited to begin the adventure that is seminary formation.  And I think the same goes for Rome.  Do I have any idea what to expect?  Not really.  Will there be challenges?  Yes.  But I could not be more excited.  Because it is during the times when we are challenged that we grow the most and learn to depend on the goodness of God.  So I pray that I can learn this semester to have a deeper trust in the Lord and experience His love in entirely new ways.  As for the Italian, I hope I learn at least enough to survive.

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe - Ruega por nosotros!   

First Post!

Hello Blog World!  Here it is, my first post.  As I will be heading off to Rome in less than a month and I had some free time at home, I thought that today would be a great time to start this blog.  And you may be asking yourself, "Why blog?"  And I think the answer is that I want to share my experiences from Rome with anyone who is interested.  It will be a great way for me to reflect on what is going on and share with my family and friends a piece of the experience that will be my semester in Rome.  So here it is.  I am hoping to maintain steady posts, usually about once a week, and doing a few different surprise segments as well.  We will have to see how busy life is and what the readers want.  So if anyone happens to stumble upon this blog before I leave, please pray for the seminarians I will be going over to Rome with and the whole Bernardi community.  This opportunity is very exciting and I am very much looking forward to immersing myself into the heart of the Catholic Church, the legendary city that is Rome.

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe - Ruega por nosotros!