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Between March and December 2024 I got to work there every Thursday and Friday. I could have been assigned to one of the other initiatives that Opus Dei supports on the same street: a little further down the street is the Nocedal school (for boys), the rectoral church of St. Josemaría (huge and colorful) and an activity center for families. I worked in a school for almost a thousand girls and, in four words, what a way to learn!
The commune
La Pintana is a lively dragon during the day, but dangerous at night. It was often in the news that such and such a neighbor had been murdered. According to the report of the National Prosecutor's Office, in the year 2023 there were 26 murders in the commune (that is, it was the ninth with the ninth highest number of homicides in the country). But nobody touches the schools of the Nocedal Foundation; on the contrary, the people take care of them and thank them to the point of tears.
At first I was warned to be careful. A few years ago, a Spanish priest was arriving at the Nocedal school in his car and got lost. Apparently, the street that was indicated by the Waze was occupied by the fair, so he decided to roll down the window and asked a young man:
-Do you know how I can get to St. Josemaría Rectory Church?
-Sure, let me see your cell phone and I'll let you know.
The priest held out his arm with the device, the young man received it gently and then fled into one of the narrow passages in the area. He did not return.
But the anecdote of the Spanish priest is in the past. Now worse things are happening. There are weapons, men who offer drug to children, crazy bullets. On one occasion, while talking with an 8th grade class in chapel, the topic of how to choose the ideal person to marry came up. I proposed a case: "You like a boy and one day you find out that he smokes marijuana, what would you think? Then a student asked, with her yellow tie a little loose and a frown on her face: "Father, I don't understand. So marijuana is bad?".
I was moved. That weed is in the girls' usual landscape, yet this was the first time they had heard anything to the contrary. But I wasn't moved by that, I was moved by something deeper: I realized that these girls were experiencing something as basic as it was absent in their day-to-day lives, conversation. We dialogued: they asked questions, exchanged ideas, thought, and we learned together. Gritty efforts if you live in a neighborhood where loud music, loud music, the Tik Tok or shouting.
I was being handed an important question on a platter: "So marijuana is bad?". A unique moment; now, would I be able to convince that little girl to stay off the drug for good?
It occurred to me to ask her back, "What do you think?". She put her hand to her chin to think and replied genuinely confused, "I don't know. In my passage a lot of people buy. And the other day my aunt told me that smoking once in a while was good for your health." I looked at the others and offered the floor. Several had similar anecdotes. The bell was coming, so I announced a change of plans for the catechetical program: "The next class will not be about the Sacraments. We'll be talking about marijuana." The class went out for recess. I felt challenged. In the next session I could not improvise, I had experienced the passion, the need to teach something.
The school
Many students prefer to stay late for extracurricular activities in order to delay going home. Their alternative is to lock themselves in their room and spend the evening watching Tik Tok. I know because I saw the consequences.
On one occasion an 8th grade girl fainted during Mass. Her teachers and classmates took her to the infirmary on a stretcher. When I went to see her, she was gone, because her mother had come to pick her up. I asked. The nurse wanted to explain to me what had happened, but she couldn't find the words. I guess she didn't want to hurt me. A young teacher understood the situation and put me in context: "Father, this is not the first fainting spell we have had. This child probably didn't eat breakfast, nor did she eat last night. And perhaps she has been eating very little for several days...". I was surprised, since the school offers breakfast to all students who need it. To my bewilderment, she continued: "Let's see, Father. These girls come to school in the morning and they are fine here. But when they go home in the afternoon, since they can't leave the house much, they spend three or four hours surfing the Internet. Tik Tok. And then come the fashions. Now there are many who have the idea of losing weight. The problem is that the method they use is to stop eating. That's why they faint.
There is a lot to do and hands are missing. I can attest that the teachers' work is difficult and hidden. These girls need much more help than the school can give them, because they come with big problems from home. Once when I went out to the playground during recess, I started talking to a group of students in the third grade and I took the opportunity to ask them about their projects. One told me: "To study nursing"; another one, "I'm not sure"; and a third one, "the only thing that interests me is to reach the age of majority so I can leave home".
On another occasion, I was in the chapel telling the 4th grade students about the miracle of the wedding at Cana, and when I said "then Jesus transformed the water into wine, that is, into grape juice", a girl exclaimed with a smile: "Ah, my dad says that every night, he says he is only going to drink a little bottle of grape juice". Some classmates smiled. Others did not. Innocence is a short-lived treasure.
Something that has always struck me is that in all the classes there are cheerful girls, and others are crushed. In some of them their yellow uniforms shine, but in others it seems that even their faces have faded to gray. A former student of Nocedal gave me his theory: when night comes, it is not so easy to sleep, because there are noises, or shots are heard and the mother enters the daughters' room to make sure that they have been thrown to the floor. In any case, even if they have slept regularly, or in the morning they may skip breakfast, the girls go back to school happy. They like it. There they find friends, the teachers treat them well, they learn Nursing and Administration, eventually they plan a future. If they are lucky, they begin to dream.
The optimism radiated by the people who work at Almendral is striking. Since 1999, the teachers have not only been teaching their classes, but they also make an effort to talk personally with each student. For the 2024 Confirmation, for example, four students chose the same teacher as their godmother. As for the assistants, many proudly tell you that they have daughters studying in this or that class, or that they are already in university.
Now a nice anecdote, although a bit insolent. I was at the door of the chapel, greeting the students passing by during recess. Many little girls say they want to "say hello to Jesus", or simply come to make the sign of the cross with the holy water (sometimes they even wash their faces). Suddenly, a little girl about six years old comes running up and stares at me.
-Hello? -I asked.
-Hello," she replies, in a shy voice.
-Do you have any questions?
-Yes.
-Dale, ask with confidence.
-Father?
-Yes, tell me...
-How did his nose get so big?
Silence. I shuffle through the options. In the end I decide to think he's just been given a lecture on Pinocchio.
-Don't worry, I've always had this nose.
-Ah, thank you!
And she ran to the backyard to continue playing with her friends.
On another occasion, I was in the same place, next to the life-size statue of St. Josemaría. Like him, I am always in my cassock. Two girls were entering the chapel close together.
-Welcome," I said.
They both gasped, as if a ghost had appeared to them in the house of terror.
-Oh, Father, we thought St. Josemaría had risen from the dead!
Nostalgia
What Almendral School does is colossal. Many girls I met there live with serious problems, but the school offers them an oasis and a launching pad. It gives them the opportunity to enter higher education (88% of the students manage to enroll). It is hard for me, but this 2025 I will stop going to La Pintana. That is why I wrote this article, as a small tribute to the teachers and assistants who are training all these young promises: they have to face all the hustle and bustle of training, and they manage to keep smiling in the midst of a hostile climate. They are the great heroines of this whole story. Thank you for teaching me so much, God bless you.
Lawyer from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, Licentiate in Theology from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross (Rome) and Doctorate in Theology from the University of Navarra (Spain).
