TLAQUEPAQUE, JAL, MX-I got in yesterday afternoon, safe and sound. Fr. Eric picked me up at the airport, which has undergone quite a face lift since the last I was here. The facade is different but the routine is the same; go through imigration and then customs. I wear clerical clothing when I travel (not all priest do), so I take for granted that people know what it means. I get to the customs station, and one of the lovely ladies working the counter asked what I do for a living. When I identified myself as a priest she acted surprised, like I was incognito or something. I felt like saying, "No, I'm really not. This is a Naru shirt. I'm here for the Relive The 60's Con." Because of the anti-clerical laws here priests couldn't legally wear clerical clothing publicaly until about ten years ago. But I mean all the priests on the telanovelas are in Roman collars, so I figured she should have been able to figure it out.
For having been gone ten years, the place hasn't changed that much. The numbers in the theologate are down, which is one big differance. This in spite of the combining of the Guadalajara and Mexico City communities. I always had the sense that some of the social trends hit down here fifteen to twenty years behind us in the States, so that the vocation plunge the Salesians took in the late eighties, early ninties is effecting them now (very unscientific opinion, I admit). But the spirit among the men seems good, and as the weekend goes on I'll fill you all in on more. I'm especially looking forward to my visit to my old parish on be writing more before then. I just heard the bell that means it's breakfast time. Hasta later.
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