More of other people's writing: WYD edition.

Great post from World Youth Day by Marc at BadCatholic.

A group of Mexican girls, here for World Youth Day, walked in and prayed with us, asking us afterwards whether we were discerning the priesthood. Assumedly, singing is a sure sign of future celibacy. Now I, in response, wished to say, "Maybe, but I am in love with a girl right now." But that's a hard sentence to form, and I speak the least Spanish of my friends. So I decided to dumb it down and tell the girls, in some what of a joke, "No, I like girls." So, rifling through my limited vocabulary, I came up with the foolproof sentence: "No, me gusta chicas." I was perturbed to notice, immediately after delivering my impeccable linguistic one-liner, a shocked and holding-back-laughter expression take hold of each of the girls. What my Spanish-speaking friend Nick immediately explained to me, and to them, was that "me gusta chicas" basically means, at least to these Mexican girls, "I find girls sexually pleasing." So re-imagine their devout question.

"Are you considering being priests?"
(I, full of confidence) "No, you girls are too hot."

Oh well. 

The rest of the post, entitled, "How to Speak Catholic," describes two more surprising encounters with language barriers.  Read it all.

I will be kicking myself for the rest of my life that I didn't make it to any World Youth Days while I was, even on a technicality, a youth.

Comments

[Barbara C.]

I didn't even know that WYD existed until about three years ago. You'd think going to Catholic school for 12 years, one of those being when it was in Denver, I would have heard something, right?

[Tabitha]

I can't wait until they announce the location of the next one. My oldest 2 girls will be old enough next time (AACK!) and I will make the *extreme sacrifice* of being a chaperone, if possible!