By Paula Day

Trading the structured life of a seminarian in the United States for an independent lifestyle in Rome, Italy, is one of the challenges Mark Lacey faced his first year in the Eternal City.

"It's very different," said the third-year theology student at the Gregorian University. "In the United States seminarians eat, sleep and go to class in the same building, or at least on the same campus." In Rome one has "to fend for himself" and is pushed to manage his time, to be a "self-starter," Lacey said.

Place this challenge in the context of an easy-going Italian culture where laundry might be ready on the pick-up day, and there is plenty of room for frustration. "You learn to roll with the punches," the seminarian added philosophically.

Lacey, a member of Holy Spirit parish when in Atlanta, is one of four seminarians from the archdiocese studying at pontifical instituted in Rome. He and second-year student John Anderson take courses at the Gregorian. Third-year theology student Greg Benassu and first-year student Hoa Tran study at the Angelicum. All four live at North American College, within walking distance of Vatican City.

"It's the most (men studying in Rome) the archdiocese has had at one time," remarked Father Don Kenny, vocations director. "They consider it a great privilege. Its a wonderful experience."

Lacey expanded on Father Kenny's remark in a telephone interview with The Georgia Bulletin.

"What you get here is a realization of the universality of the Church," the 28-year-old observed. "All European countries are represented, and some African countries as well." Lacey listed French, German, Spanish, Hungarian and Irish students from Europe as well as men from Ethiopia, Uganda, Nigeria, Zaire, New Guinea and the Philippines -- 200 students speaking 15 to 20 languages.

While he misses the pastoral setting of home and is grateful for summers spent in Atlanta parishes "that keep you in touch with why you're here," he realizes the Rome experience can't be duplicated.

"It's mind-boggling, incredible. I never dreamed I'd have this chance." He has met the pope and Mother Teresa. World-renowned theologians such as Avery Dulles and Gerald O'Collins are his professors, and he is being intimately "exposed to Church history," past and present. He has visited basilicas and seen more great art in the form of statuary, paintings, frescos and tapestries than most hope to see in a lifetime.

"I can look out my window," Lacey said, "and see St. Peter's. I can hear the bells of the Vatican ring every 15 minutes and the Holy Father giving his Sunday address."

North American College has the "best view in town," sitting on Janiculum Hill with no obstructing buildings. The Via Della Conciliazione in front of the college leads directly to the Vatican.

The college offers a five-year program with most students attending either the Jesuit-run Gregorian, or the Dominican Angelicum. This fall 120 men are living at North American College, but Rome is a potpourri of clergy, Religious brothers and sisters studying at various national colleges.

There are other challenges, Lacey said. Language is one. All his classes are in Italian and life outside college walls is negotiated in the native tongue. Lacey is conversant in Spanish and took courses in Italian before going to Rome, but hadn't mastered the spoken language.

"You see somebody talking and you have no idea what they're saying," he said. "It continues to be a challenge. You pick up some; you understand the concepts but not the nuances. You have to go back and look up what is meant."

The seminarian has stopped on the street to question a passerby and then be unable to understand the answer. Although he recognizes a gradual improvement in his language skills, he ruefully admits to understanding now "how Hispanics (in the U.S.) must feel, and their frustration."

The American admires the Italians. "It's such a wonderful life here," he said. "You're thrown right in with the people, walking around everyday with these people and learning how they live. They would rather have fun than have a nice car. They think more of living a good life than having material things."

Meals at the college are "excellent if you like Italian food," Lacey reports. The seminarians eat out occasionally, but have to choose the place carefully because of expense. They have found a small, four-table restaurant where the mother of the family prepares the food in her kitchen and is particularly good to the American seminarians.

"She feeds us and feeds us," Lacey said, "and when we ask how much it costs, we know she's cut the bill." Other necessities are expensive as well. A bottle of shampoo or a tube of toothpaste costs five dollars.

If Atlantans think rush hour is a headache, they should experience Rome's four-times-a-day stampede. "The taxi drivers are crazy," according to the seminarian. "They honk at each other, scream at each other, scream at you and you scream back." The Italian custom of repose, taking time in the middle of the day to close everything down and rest, means Lacey travels to and from the Gregorian twice on narrow, winding streets, many of cobblestone.

Being so far from home, especially during the holidays, is difficult for the seminarians. Complicating matters is the six-hour time difference and snags in the telecommunications system.

"I'm lucky if I can talk 20 minutes at Christmas with my family," he said.

Last year Christmas for the young American was somewhat of a treat. He spent the holidays with a Benedictine community in Engelberg, Switzerland. The experience, minus the commercial hoopla, gave him a "whole different sense" of the holy season. And he enjoyed ice skating on an Alpine lake.

"I think all of us really appreciate that the bishop has chosen to send us here," Lacey concluded, "and we're grateful to the people of the archdiocese who are giving money ... (so we can) get this education."

The decision to educate a specific seminarian in Rome is reached by consensus among the archbishop, the vocations director and the candidate, Father Kenny pointed out. Language facility is certainly a needed quality. Rome is a good place to educate young men who will be diocesan administrators. "It's one of the ways we get people for chancery and Tribunal work," the vocations director said.