From the front page of the Catholic News Service. (Pele has put on a few pounds since the days when he was playing in his prime.)

What's new?...

With our new bishop in the Clementine Chapel at St. Peter's Basilica. The bones believed to be of St. Peter are just behind the altar here.

Time for another update!

I met my new bishop for the first time. We celebrated mass with him almost every day he was here and we able to spend ample amounts of time with him. Duluth is so blessed to have such a humble, simple, normal priest for its Bishop. Praise God. With God's grace and the humble response of all of us in the diocese, I see a lot of hope for our diocese. In fact there is a lot of hope for the whole Church and therefore the world in the priests that Pope Benedict is choosing to be bishops. They are all simple, orthodox, prayerful pastors who love Christ and his Church.

I just finished my first set of exams. I finally can say I have been fully initiated into life over here. As I mentioned earlier I had eight classes my first semester and consequently, I had eight finals, five of which were oral finals. There is a technique to doing well on an oral exam and it isn't all studying. At least that is what they tell me, however, I haven't figured it out yet. I did do well on the oral exams but I still feel more comfortable taking a written exam.

We also had our first soccer game yesterday. We won 2-1 in penalty kicks. (I scored on my pk attempt! my siblings would be proud I know) Its really neat. There is a league made up of all the national seminaries in Rome. There are a couple of sponsors that provide uniforms and the Knights of Columbus organize the whole competition. We play seven regular season games, one every weekend, and then there are playoffs. Our whole seminary gets into it, we even have a booster club. Here is an article from the Catholic News Agency on the game

I also officially started my apostolate last week. I spend a little over an hour visiting patients at a local hospital. It is a challenge because most of the patients only speak Italian, but the people are always cheerful and very patient with my Italian. I am going to need to find a way to improve my Italian throughout the week, because visiting patients for an hour a week isn't going to help and it will just get frustrating. Praise God though, its good to struggle, its humility, I need to be knocked down a few pegs every once in awhile and doing this once a week should help. One of the good things is that there are usually always new patients every time I go. So no matter how bad I bomb one day, the next time I go, those new patients won't have a clue about the previous week. There is also a woman who is always in the hospital's chapel when we visit. She is like the prophetess Anna in the Gospels. Every time we go she gives us 5 euros for coffee. So before every visit we get a little pick me up. Although my Italian isn't great I still feel I can bring some joy, or at least a break in the monotony for the patients. Its one of the corporeal works of mercy.

I am happy that Lent is finally here, and its not because I am some holy aesthetic who enjoys doing penance. On the contrary, I was put in charge of organizing the Mardi Gras party for the seminary, and I am glad that that is over with. It turned out well and everyone had a good time. Its just not the easiest getting guys interested in helping out and excited about the party while finals are going on.

Anther sweet thing about Lent in Rome are the station churches. For every day of Lent their is a particular church associated with it. So every day we celebrate mass at a different Church. It is a tradition going back to the 3rd century and made a Latin practice by Pope Gregory the Great in the 6th century. Over the years though it fell out of practice until Pope Leo XIII at the turn of the 20th century and John XXIII fully restored the custom in 1959. Our seminary organizes a mass at each of these churches for all the faithful to attend. So depending on where the church is we leave at different times ranging from 6am to 6:45 to arrive at the church for 7am mass. Some bus, some cab, some bike, but most of us walk, which I have done so far. The great thing is that some of these churches are closed for most times of the year and when they have their station mass, it is one of the few times that they are actually open to the public. Its a great way to see some of the oldest and most beautiful churches in the world. Walking through Rome early in the morning when it is completely dark out and rainy (it has rained three of the four mornings), you really feel like you're on a pilgrimage.

Anyways, I pray that your Lent will be a fruitful one. Remember that we are a sacramental Church. All our external actions point towards an internal reality. So that the prayer, fasting, and almsgiving all represent our desire to grow closer to Christ. It is our making room for Him to come into our lives. These actions also allow us grow in solidarity towards others. They allow us to turn our hearts outwards, we are then more disposed to others' needs and wants rather than our own. An internal conversion needs to take place otherwise we are all just Pharisees, and we all know what Jesus thought of them.

Please feel free if you have any questions or comments to email me @ nnelson@pnac.org

I also wanted to give a shout out to my good friend from back home Ryan who was just engaged to his girlfriend Taylor. Please keep them in your prayers.

God bless!