It was during my “Moral de la Persona” class, assuming I was in for a peaceful Friday morning like the others. During this extra year of formation I am auditing a few classes at the Universidad Ecclecial San Damaso, where the rest of my community is studying their degree. The classes are obviously in Spanish and are really good from what I can tell. Oh, by the way, I don’t really know Spanish.
This class happens to be the one that I understand the least due in part to the abstract nature of the content, the voice of the professor and my lack of supplement notes. Its not bad, I just don’t follow it as well as the other classes. The advantage though is the professor uses a lot of quotes, diagrams, ecclesical documents (I look them up in English) and for now seems to be following a lot of the Theology of the Body. The themes aren’t new to me, but its always good to revisit things from a different perspective. After about the third class I thought that I should introduce myself to the professor and explain that I am just auditing due to my current English bias (just in case he wonders why that one woman in the back doesn’t laugh at his jokes). Thank God there is one other consecrated in the class (who, ironically, doesn’t really speak English) who went with me to help introduce me. It was great, I told him I was here from the States for my last year of formation and to learn Spanish. He told me that I was more than welcome here and that he had been to New York once. We said our farewells and began the second period of class.
A while later I’m looking up the section on “Eros and Agape” from Deus Caritas Est he has cited when I hear the phrase “en ingles” and then “falling law”. This statement hit my ears wrong and I think, ´that didn’t sound like spanish´. The class falls silent as I feel 38 pairs of eyes turn around and stare at me while the professor smiles. I look up like a deer in the headlights to see my consecrated sister in the third row look at me with that wide-eyed, semi- smiling, embarrassed expression that says what I am feeling “AHHH!!! He just called on me! What was the question?? Didn’t I tell him I don’t really speak Spanish?!”
“Perdon, ¿que?” The class (all seminarians except for a handful) begins to laugh.
He repeats with a smile: “You say ´fall in law´? ¿si?”
It makes no sense… Are we talking about natural law or The Fall? And what does this have to do with Deus Caritas Est?
At this point the other consecrated comes to my rescue and says to him “Falling in love”- evidently we were talking about how it is necessary for man to experience “falling in love”. He recognizes his mistake, everyone laughs and the class continues as I look down and try to keep from crawling under the desk in unilingual embarrassment. The best part was leaving after class finished and suddenly hearing a lot of the seminarians discuss their interest about “falling in love”.
Our Lord has hilarious ways of breaking the ice. From my nice little comfort zone, Lord Jesus deliver me.
