‘The best journey takes you home’ is a very famous quote that describes well what happens at Sedes Sapientiae College every year at the beginning of September. New seminarians arrive from different parts of the world and older seminarians return from the parishes where they have helped in pastoral work. Among the new faces, there are also two formators: don Sergio Tapia-Velasco (new Rector) and don Jaime Moya. The warm weather in the Eternal City is no longer scorching as it was in August. The Seminary gets underway with the September Course, centred on pastoral formation and the Italian Course for newcomers.
On 2 September, the Mass of the Holy Spirit marked the beginning of the formation year. It was celebrated in the prelatic church of Our Lady of Peace, where the sacred body of St. Josemaría, founder of Opus Dei, rests. After mass, the seminarians visited the crypt where the tombs of the former prelates of Opus Dei are buried. We gathered for a moment of prayer before blessed Alvaro del Portillo, founder of our seminary.
On Sunday, 1 September, some students, together with don Eduardo Baura, had visited the Mamertina prison and the Forum of Trajan as part of the Imparare Roma (learn Rome) programme; and on Tuesday, 3 September, a larger group visited the church of Santa Sabina on the Aventine Hill. The Master General of the Order of Preachers, Fr Gerard Timoner, greeted us and spoke with us in the historic corridor of the cloister. On Sunday 8 September, a group of seminarians together with don Eduardo Gil went on an excursion to the mountains of Mount Velino.
The formation course is underway. Don Sergio is teaching the homiletics classes, and the oral presentations of the homilies and sermons prepared by the final year students have begun. The second-year students have spiritual direction classes, taught by Fr Paul O`Callaghan. The first-year students, having overcome their initial perplexity with the new language, are now continuing with intermediate Italian classes.
