Si Dios es por nosotros, ¿quién contra nosotros?”

or

“Yo soy un disco quebrado / yo tengo chicle en cerebro”

Yesterday as I was having lunch at home, I heard screams coming from outside. Curiosity getting the better of me, I opened the door half expecting to see mushroom cloud in the distance.

Thankfully, it wasn’t the Holocaust or an episode of Jack Van Impe’s show. No, I was confronted with a hundred Hispanic teenagers marching down West Seminary Drive waving Mexican flags and chanting “Rah, Rah, Rah!” and “Viva la Mexico!” Since they were not singing, “Another Brick In The Wall,” I assumed that this had more to do with American immigration policies than the American educational system. Or did it?

You know, if your protesting about not being allowed to come illegally into America from Mexico, it doesn’t help your cause to chant “Viva la Mexico!” and way the Mexican national flag.

Of course, the students were getting a lot of support from the neighborhood. Cars would drive buy, wave a Mexican flag out of the window and honk their horn to the cheers of the students.

The local police were there as well. Since the students were walking on the sidewalk with the flow of traffic, a few patrol cars were following right beside them. I assumed that the officers were simply protecting the youth from any traffic problems but, apparently, they were trying to get the students back into class. The students responded by crossing the street at the next light and walking against the flow of traffic to keep the cops from following them so close. Clever little baskets, aren’t they?

I wasn’t the only seminary student watching parade. Another gentleman was looking as well and glanced at me with a semi-smile. “You know what they’re marching for, don’t you?” he asked.

“Sure, I do,” I replied. “They’re getting outta class!”

Yes, I really do not think that these students give beans about American immigration policies. But they do care about the teenage wasteland that is public education. Evidence for this opinion is explained by the fact that the student protests all seem to end around 3:00pm.

Now I make no public stance for or against the American immigration policy, but, darn it, I will support students playing truant from school. Heck, we all remember high school and middle school. What we wouldn’t have given to have had such an excuse to skip class. We always had to call in a bomb threat in order to delay exams to the next day! These kids today can cite noble principles or whatever to get out of P.E. I wonder if I can do that to get out of Worship class?

Nevertheless, I decided to signify my approval for their cleverness in skipping class by “honking” my car horn.

By the time I had gotten to my car (parked at E.D. Head) and made it up to where the students were marching they had just reached the entrance to the seminary. So, in my (wife’s) car with the “GOD IS ABLE” license plate and red seminary parking sticker, I turned into the main seminary entrance, honked the car horn and gave the peace sign to them thru the open car window.

The students then cheered and some of them began to yell, “Aye, the seminary’s for us! God is able! He’s for us!” And then a one of them began to yell, ““¿Si Dios es por nosotros, ¿quién contra nosotros?”

Neither the police officers nor the blue shirts who were working in the flower beds appeared to be as enthusiastic as the students.

So that is how I spent my Tuesday afternoon.