by Mark Steffl

This past September, Craig Timmerman and I began our theological studies at the Pontifical North American College in Rome, Italy. The North American College is home to roughly 180 seminarians from the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico in addition to about 80 priests who are doing graduate work. It has provided us a chance to learn more about the Catholic faith in the United States through the seminarians and priests we have met from all over North America. We have also been able to experience our universal Catholic faith through visiting sites important in the development our faith such as the places where martyrs have given their lives.

Many come to study from countries where Christianity is oppressed or even outlawed, bringing the awareness that in our age of "religious tolerance" there are still many who die for their faith in many corners of the world. I have met a priest from Sudan who has kept his identity secret from government authorities to avoid arrest. I met a priest from Hong Kong whose bishop has been reprimanded by the new Chinese Communist authorities several times for not "knowing his place" in the scheme of a communist society.

I have met so many men and women who have given up everything they had including family and societal acceptance to follow Christ.

My education and formation here has also been blessed by the fact that we at the North American College are in such close proximity to the Holy Father and particularly in this Jubilee Year of 2000. It has brought at least 25 million pilgrims to Rome this Jubilee Year from all corners of the globe. The message of the Holy Father calling for a ‘new evangelization’ of the world and a new re-awakening to the words of Christ calling us to love and respect as we integrate our Catholic faith into our lives around the world. There have been special Jubilee Masses for families, for catechists, for bishops, for priests, and so more youth than expected came to Rome to brave the oppressive Italian summer sun to hear the Holy Father commission them to live and share their faith in the totality of Christ’s message. The Mass and closing of the Holy Door at Saint Peter’s Basilica on January 6, 2001, the feast of Epiphany, was particularly memorable as countless tens of thousands came to solemnly celebrate the end of the Holy Year with the Holy Father.

The Mass on the Solemnity of Mary, the ‘Mass of Peace’ held a specific importance for me during the Jubilee Year. Thirteen seminarians from the North American College, including myself, were servers for the Holy Father’s Mass on that occasion. It was a special privilege to meet the Holy Father and to be in such close proximity to the man who has given of himself so completely to the church and the task of bringing the message of Christ to a world of sin and consumerism.

My studies in Rome as a seminarian in preparation for ordination to the priesthood have given me many opportunities to learn, develop, and deepen my faith, which, God willing, I will be able to bring back to the Diocese of New Ulm as a priest.

Seminarian Mark Steffl is studying for the Diocese of New Ulm.