A Few Things

I'm about to disappear for a couple weeks. By that I mean that our final studio project is due in just under two weeks, and I won't really have any free time til then (and not much sleeping time either). Oh, and I'm also going to London for 3 days in there for Thanksgiving...we bought our tickets when we thought the project was due tomorrow, and so we'd be able to relax and enjoy the trip. The deadline got extended to December 7th, which is good, but means the trip timing is not as good. But it'll be fun anyway.

Before I drop off the face of the earth though, I want to write quickly about a few things I've been meaning to. First, last week I visited the Basilica of St. Paul's Outside the Walls for the first time. It was the feast of the dedications of St. Peter's and St. Paul's. I had to take a bus to get there--it really is "outside the walls":-). It was awesome. St. Paul's tomb is there, along with one of the chains that bound him in jail. Being at the tomb reminded me of something that happened over the summer--the Pope announced that DNA evidence has confirmed that the remains in the tomb belong to a male about the age St. Paul is believed to have been when he died, and from that time period. So it's pretty much for sure that it's him. Anyway, I found out about this during Totus Tuus, and my teammate Craig was SO excited about it. When the boys picked us up that morning, it was all he could talk about. And I remember him saying "I LOVE being Catholic!". So it was way cool to actually be there. I also had some really good prayer time--I reflected on what the relationship of Peter and Paul was like. I imagine that they were pretty good buddies, maybe joked around with each other, both very energetic and dynamic. But then I wondered about the quieter times when they were alone together--did St. Paul ever ask St. Peter to tell him about the time he spent with Jesus? And I thought about how amazingly smart St. Paul must have been, to be able to write all those letters. And they were just letters, things he sent in the mail (whatever sort of mail they had back then. Pigeons? Probably not. Donkeys? Maybe just people?) Anyway, it was sort of a challenge to me to not shy away from deep or intellectual conversations throughout a normal day.

On a lighter note, I experienced another important part of Italian culture a few days ago. I went to a movie theater! I saw New Moon, one of the Twilight movies. It was in English:-) But, actually, part of it at the end is set in Italy, in a town we drove by between Florence and Siena. They spoke a few Italian phrases, and I understood those! It was fun. And not much different than an American theater. Maybe a place where they just showed Italian movies would be different, I don't know.

Well, I have to go to class now. Pray for me these next couple of weeks!