The Day Finally Came

After a year of knowing I was going to Rome for the Catholic Studies Semester, I am finally here!! This is unbelievable.

We flew in yesterday morning at around 7:45 AM and because of our great lack of sleep, we were walking zombies. The only thing that kept me up was the fact that I was in Rome, Italy not only for a week but for four months. It still hadn't sunk in that this is where I will live for the next four months!!

Nervous? Too awestruck and tired to tell. Excited? Too awestruck and tired to tell.

All I did know at that moment was that I will be getting on this bus and going back to Bernardi, the building owned by St. Thomas specifically to serve as my home for the next few months. This is all real. Someone pinch me!!! Even once I finally set down my bags in my new room, it still hadn't hit me. Was this really happening? Am I really this blessed? God is WAAAY too kind to me. I do not deserve to have this great blessing but I accept it with a beyond opened heart! God had a reason to give me this opportunity and so far, I'm not complaining one bit!!

Anyway, a group of us decided we were going to walk to St. Peter's Basilica and go to Mass down there. It was 14 seminarians in cassocks and two of us non-seminarians dressed nicely. If you want to draw the attention of every Italian walking down the street, travel with 14 men wearing black cassocks!! The walk was hardly anything and I was in awe of how beautiful my surroundings were. Then I saw it:

Seeing St. Peter's Basilica for the first time was beyond words. This is easily one of the most famous buildings in the world and I, a mere college student from Minnesota, am here admiring this stunning architecture from hundreds of years ago. Excitement was inexplicable!!!

Then we entered the basilica to attend Mass and it was there that I finally felt it. As I watched a priest giving a homily and celebrating the Most Holy Mass in Italian, I realized that this is my life. This is all real and this is where I will live for the next few months. This is my new home!! I am in the capital of the Catholic Church and I am here receiving Christ in the Most Holy Eucharist. Absolutely incredible!!

I look forward to the months to come. ARRIVEDERCI!!!