First day of class, and I taught at the first period in the morning (from 8:10 to 9:30). It is the same course that I taught last year in Rome, on the life and spirit of St Francis de Sales. I've got 14 in the class, even though only one had preregistered. I had to call Stella Niagara for more books, and then spent this afternoon in Kinkos running off the notes for the course. I'm doing them Italian style (dispensa), though they are in English (of course).
In the evening after dinner, Fr Esteban Ortiz asked to meet with Frs Dave Purdy and Tom Prendiville with myself present, to talk about the request that I go to teach a semester each year at the UPS in Rome. While I would love to go back to Rome even tomorrow, I realize that there is no one to take up the work I am doing here. We need support for the program in Salesian spirituality at Berkeley or this will fade into nothing.
Well, we did not come to any solution, but exchanged views for over an hour. In December and January I will go to the UPS and offer a condensed course in the last six weeks of the Fall Semester there. In the meantime, we need to look for more stable support for our programs at ISS in Berkeley and work more in partnership rather than in opposition to the UPS.
How do the others feel about all this? I don't know. If truth be told, I feel very emotionally involved. It is my life and future that is on the line, after all, and I am torn really between Rome and Berkeley.
Truth be told… nice phrase to quote in the Bocca della Verità!
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