Yesterday's wedding at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Nashville was conducted in English.
It was done so out of courtesy to the groom and his family, good Tennessee folks who happen to be English-speaking people of a different culture.
David is a very profitable businessman who travels around the world. And on one stop in Bogota, Colombia, his eyes befell a beauty named Rocio -- another professional who worked in a travel agency.
Love is the universal language, and somehow they communicated. She knows English because of the demands of her profession, but she does not readily speak it. You see I'm the same way with Spanish. I know a lot of it. But it is still intimidating to speak it to someone who has been doing so all their lives. And then they speak so quickly. Que lastima!
Love for themselves, and God, however, brought David and Rocio yesterday to Our Lady's. And their wedding was beautiful.
Afterward, I told Father Fernando Garcia, pastor of Our Lady's and a fellow Colombian, that the wedding represented the future of Nashville and this nation. Despite all the politics and bigotry of elected leaders like Councilman Eric Crafton and congressperson Marsha Blackburn, love and God would triumph ultimately.
These politicos would demand everyone only speak English. But if Nashville and this nation are to be prosperous and save themselves from the ongoing economic downturn, they had better be open to different languages. China, the world's new economic power with a GDP at 9.5 percent, will soon be the largest English-speaking nation in the world.
Why? They want two languages spoken by their government and people because that means businessmen like David will be more comfortable when they come and make big business deals to employ more Chinese citizens. They want two languages spoken by their government and people because that means their children will be able to find high-paying jobs overseas and send the money back home.
To paraphrase Disney, it should be a small world afterall. And yesterday at the wedding, we learned that not all from Colombia is negative and drug-releated despite news media portrayals. Father Fernando and Rocio proved that.
The joining of David and Rocio pointed to the wonderful American future of people from different places and cultures joining and raising families of new citizens who have the great advantage of two languages and cultures in the same household. Yet their Americanism will always previal. It always has been that way and it always will be. My family's heritage proves that.
We are Americans first.
Marriages like those of David and Rocio will be more frequent as the number of Americans of Hispanic descent through births in this nation multiplies to 30 percent of the U.S. population by 2050. And despite Crafton and Blackburn, more and more people of different cultures and languages will discover the good and God in one another.
And love.
No comments:
Post a Comment