Roamin' in Romania

So last week, I was able to travel to Romania with three friends.  It was a pretty amazing experience.  This part of Eastern Europe was just absolutely beautiful.  We flew into the regional capital of Transylvania, call Cluj and drove to various cities around the region.  Though Romania is a heavily Orthodox country, there are some Eastern Catholics and there is significant Hungarian minority in region, which is mostly Roman Catholic.  Thus we did had no trouble finding mass throughout our trip, yet were exposed to new kinds of beautiful architecture and stunning religious art.  In Cluj itself, we were able to walk to three different cathedrals (Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, and Greek Orthodox) in one afternoon.  We all commented on how uplifting it was to see such bold faith in a country that was severely damaged by the Soviet communism. 

One of the most memorable things about the whole trip was just driving through the country side.  They only have one expressway in Transylvania, which only extends about 50km, then it’s all winding road that pass through every small town on the way.  So, besides the beautiful landscape, we got a close look at the average town and its people.  It almost felt like something you would see in the move:  traditional dress and horse and wagon and all. 

But I think what struck me most was that each town, which only took a couple minute to drive though at a significantly slowed down pace, had a small church – small but gorgeous.  It naturally got me thinking of the priests that serve in these parishes.  Now just coming from Rome, the point of Catholic connections and business (that is busy-ness), it was easy to almost recoil with how small and isolated each church was, and to ask what could they possibly do of real significance in such a place [see rant at the end if you want further thoughts on this].  But as we kept driving and we saw more and more towns and I began to notice the people more and more, just going about their daily activities.  They weren’t worried that they were missing something by not living in a big city like Rome; they were simply living their live to the best way they knew, living lives of love and fulfillment. 

Now I may be assuming a lot about these people that I never talked to, but it brought me back to my desire to be a priest- to be with the people and grow with them in love of one another and in praise and love of God.  It is the marvel of a life of simple fulfillment, to be a priest and live each day doing ordinary tasks for the love of God and love the parish.  What more could one want?  What more could one do?  If you do that, the day is completely filled! There’s not time for anything else. 

It’s after experiences like this that my time to return to Phoenix seem so far away.  Though….there is no reason why I can live with this simple love now… I should get my act together….This is why I’m still in formation.  Keep the prayers coming!

St. Martin of Tours, pray for us.

ALERT- THIS IS NOT PART OF THE REST OF THE POST- PHILOSOPHICAL TANGENT DON’T READ UNLESS YOU REALLY WANT TO:  Ok with that said, I had this tangential reflection during my Ecclesiology (study of the Church) class the other day.  Right before classes started this semester, I finished a book by a French philosopher that I thought had some very relevant reflections for the contemporary world (I know I read French philosophy in my spare time, whatever, I told you not to read this unless you really wanted).  In this book he talks about the temptation of numbers, that is giving statistics about a movement or group to express their strength and prove points (see 2 Sam 24).  Yet the over use of numbers degrades the people included in such movements or groups in to mere units, just an indistinguishable point in a mass.  I can see this temptation embrace in the Church often- after all Catholics make up 25% of the population of the United States, if we all voted together we could completely change the country.  Even still this can happen even around vocations.  We can get so excited about a number of seminarians or priests we have - then we have a large army with which to implement truly Catholic things.  But we are not raising army, we are not making cogs for the great Catholicism machine.  No we are raising priests; and this is what all those little churches throughout the Romanian country side mean for me.  The beauty of the Church, of being Catholic, is that the universality of the faith never destroys the particularity of that faith lived out in the local churches around the world.  A priest when he lives the gospel, builds up the Kingdom of God, and a Christian follows their vocation of love, builds the Kingdom of God.  Yes we pray that we may “be of the same mind, with the same love, united in heart, thinking of one thing” (Phil 2:2); but we are not united in heart with one another because we work with each other for one goal,  we are united because of the same Spirit that works through us for each other.  Our hope does not rest on our growing numbers (for when they stop growing, or fall, what happens to us and our hope); our hope is in Chirst, and Him crucified.  The beauty of the Christian life in general, and the priesthood in particular, is that by living personally in the life of Christ we form a universal community (the antithesis of a mob) the power of which this world of political movements has no knowledge.  Thus, the pitiable impotence that the world of “busy-ness” might read into this isolated little churches, is exactly where the gospel is lived, is exactly where Christ and His entire Church acts together daily, is exactly where the world is changed; and that’s the only place a priest should want to find himself.