Sister constantly reminded us to take our faith beyond Bible class, an oasis to the spirit amid the desert of Dubai where she taught me and about twenty other boys for at least two years.
Come to the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, she told us. Jesus waits to spend time with you. He asks for just one hour.
A teenage boy just like us comes every Monday, Sister said in English as sonorous as her native Italian, recalling with a smile and twinkling eyes how the boy sang off-key the hymns to Jesus in the Sacred Host.
That is all right, said Sister, who also conducted us in the youth choir. What matters is that you come and do everything from the heart.
She did everything that way, from teaching not only religious studies but also the sciences, learning French and Arabic to organizing summer fundraising bazaars for the poor of the world where she invited us to volunteer as sales attendants.
I found her old and lovely when I met her twenty years ago. Sixteen years went by after I left high school before I again saw her, older, lovelier, taking the faith beyond her order’s headquarters by the narrow Via Paolina in Rome.
We visited a third time one afternoon, a couple of days after Christmas 2015. I buzzed the intercom and heard her speak. “Ah, Jason. Come in,” she said. I pushed open the door.
Sister stood inside, ready to bestow a pair each of Italian kisses that warmed away the feel of the Roman winter to me and my friend, also her former student.
She ushered us into their sala, where we sat, and she asked and listened to us speak about how we have been, and gave us a peek at her own grandmotherly days.
She went to Mass daily, often at the nearby Chiesa di Sant´Alfonso di Liguori all´Esquilino, the church that houses the original icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary under the title Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
After retiring from teaching, she had served, somewhere in the city, on help desks for needy immigrants. Even in her octogenarian days, she helps at a center that teaches the poor language and information technology skills.
At some point, having served us cappuccino-filled chocolates, and given each of us a present, a pen with a tiny picture of Pope Francis on the cap, she asked us, one on one, “Do you pray?”
Once, a woman in dire straits came by the house to ask for bread, she said. Sister found it scandalous that someone in Italy did not have money even to buy a piece of bread, and she herself was poor, but she had the faith to deal with it.
I took my empty purse, Sister said, and placed it on the head of a statue of Saint Joseph, because he is the patron of workers. Look, she told him, I do not have money. You must do something, because I want to help.
A couple of days later, someone came to the house to donate loads of pasta that Sister soon gave away.
Midway through our conversation, a woman called. Sister got up and opened the door. They walked towards the kitchen and stopped. Sister gave the woman a bag of groceries.
She asked about our health and our love lives. I would like to see your girlfriend next time, she told my friend, telling him they should marry soon, to receive the blessing of God.
Marriage is not about running a grand show, she said, and it is not about external beauty, which fades away, but about internal beauty, that the couple discovers more and more of in each other as they grow old together. Family is the greatest institution God made, she said. In the garden of Eden, there were no priests or nuns, only man and woman, family. Priests and nuns were instituted later, to help the family.
“And you, what do you do,” she said, turning to me. “Will you get married or become a priest?” I gave her my answer. “Do not worry. If it is written,” she said, “there will be someone for you.”
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