James Martin, S.J.

Doubtless there will be some readers who will find this an inappropriate topic for the blog of a Catholic magazine.  And who will no doubt roll their eyes.  It is hardly a recondite topic.  But I have to ask: Have you seen the video of the woman called Susan Boyle singing on the American Idolish show called “Britain’s Got Talent?” 

It may be the best example of the how God sees us–and the way that the world often doesn’t. 

Ms. Boyle, a matronly 48-year-old unemployed woman, who touchingly described herself on camera as “never been married, never been kissed,” lives in a small Scottish village in the flat where she was raised, with her cat, Pebbles.  A devout Catholic, she had spent the last several years caring for her ailing mother, who recently died at age 91.  When she strode onto the stage of “Britain’s Got Talent,” you could see the contemptuous grimaces in the crowd.  And when the heavyset woman smilingly announced that she would sing the vocally challenging song from “Les Miserables” called “I Dreamed a Dream,” you could see the collective judges (including the ever-present Simon Cowell) literally roll their eyes in barely disguised disgust.  Please.  

When Ms. Boyle opened her mouth, however, out came a voice that silenced her critics.   Watch her video (which is unembeddable) here if you haven’t already. 

Her Youtube video at last count has received, all tolled in its many incarnations, tens of millions of hits.  Why?  A few reasons, some obvious, one not.  First, there is the shock factor: what a surprise that this unknown woman can sing so well!  Where has she been all these years?  Second, the sympathy factor: we feel compassion for a somewhat plain woman who seems to have been so unlucky in life.  Third, the physical appearance factor: “American Idol” stardom, or even success, is typcically the province of the PYTs, pretty young things.  Not of people like Susan Boyle.  Fourth, the Big Discovery factor: the thrill of perhaps seeing a new career jumpstarted, a formerly “unknown” person (a la Ronan Tynan) thrust into the limelight.  Fourth, the uncanny resonance of the lyrics of her chosen song, for someone who seems to be travelling through a tough patch of life: “I dreamed a dream in time gone by/ When hope was high,/ And life worth living/I dreamed that love would never die/ I dreamed that God would be forgiving.”  

But there may be something else that accounts for our delight, and for those millions of hits.

The way we see Susan Boyle is very nearly the way God sees us: worthwhile, special, talented, unique, beautiful.  The world generally looks askance at people like Susan Boyle, if it sees them at all.  Without classic good looks, without work, without a spouse, living in a small town, people like Susan Boyle may not seem particularly “important.”  But God sees the real person, and understands the value of each individual’s gifts: rich or poor, young or old, single or married, matron or movie star, lucky or unlucky in life.  God knows us.  And loves us.  

“Everybody is somebody” said Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan at his installation Mass in New York City yesterday.  That’s another reason why the judges smile and the audience explodes in applause. 

Because they recognized a basic truth planted deep within them by God: Susan Boyle is somebody. 

Everybody is somebody.

James Martin, SJ

© 2009 America Press Inc.

James Martin, S.J.

Doubtless there will be some readers who will find this an inappropriate topic for the blog of a Catholic magazine.  And who will no doubt roll their eyes.  It is hardly a recondite topic.  But I have to ask: Have you seen the video of the woman called Susan Boyle singing on the American Idolish show called “Britain’s Got Talent?” 

It may be the best example of the how God sees us–and the way that the world often doesn’t. 

Ms. Boyle, a matronly 48-year-old unemployed woman, who touchingly described herself on camera as “never been married, never been kissed,” lives in a small Scottish village in the flat where she was raised, with her cat, Pebbles.  A devout Catholic, she had spent the last several years caring for her ailing mother, who recently died at age 91.  When she strode onto the stage of “Britain’s Got Talent,” you could see the contemptuous grimaces in the crowd.  And when the heavyset woman smilingly announced that she would sing the vocally challenging song from “Les Miserables” called “I Dreamed a Dream,” you could see the collective judges (including the ever-present Simon Cowell) literally roll their eyes in barely disguised disgust.  Please.  

When Ms. Boyle opened her mouth, however, out came a voice that silenced her critics.   Watch her video (which is unembeddable) here if you haven’t already. 

Her Youtube video at last count has received, all tolled in its many incarnations, tens of millions of hits.  Why?  A few reasons, some obvious, one not.  First, there is the shock factor: what a surprise that this unknown woman can sing so well!  Where has she been all these years?  Second, the sympathy factor: we feel compassion for a somewhat plain woman who seems to have been so unlucky in life.  Third, the physical appearance factor: “American Idol” stardom, or even success, is typcically the province of the PYTs, pretty young things.  Not of people like Susan Boyle.  Fourth, the Big Discovery factor: the thrill of perhaps seeing a new career jumpstarted, a formerly “unknown” person (a la Ronan Tynan) thrust into the limelight.  Fourth, the uncanny resonance of the lyrics of her chosen song, for someone who seems to be travelling through a tough patch of life: “I dreamed a dream in time gone by/ When hope was high,/ And life worth living/I dreamed that love would never die/ I dreamed that God would be forgiving.”  

But there may be something else that accounts for our delight, and for those millions of hits.

The way we see Susan Boyle is very nearly the way God sees us: worthwhile, special, talented, unique, beautiful.  The world generally looks askance at people like Susan Boyle, if it sees them at all.  Without classic good looks, without work, without a spouse, living in a small town, people like Susan Boyle may not seem particularly “important.”  But God sees the real person, and understands the value of each individual’s gifts: rich or poor, young or old, single or married, matron or movie star, lucky or unlucky in life.  God knows us.  And loves us.  

“Everybody is somebody” said Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan at his installation Mass in New York City yesterday.  That’s another reason why the judges smile and the audience explodes in applause. 

Because they recognized a basic truth planted deep within them by God: Susan Boyle is somebody. 

Everybody is somebody.

James Martin, SJ

© 2009 America Press Inc.

For the first time ever, the Superior-General of Jesuits, Rev. Fr Adolfo Nicolas, will be visiting Nigeria and Ghana , starting tomorrow.

As part of his itinerary, which spans three days, Fr. Nicolas, the ‘Father- General’, as he is fondly called, will be visiting Loyola Jesuit College (LJC) in the Federal Capital Territory , Abuja Principal of Loyola Jesuit College , Rev. Fr. John-Okoria Ibhakewala, said in a statement that, we are most honoured to have him with us here at LJC for about two days.Ibhakewala who said there will be a mass for Fr. Nicolas tomorrow and a picnic with him thereafter, called on parents and friends to join the school in hosting Father-General?

The statement also said that a dinner in honour of the Father General which will have in attendance, amongst others, a member of LJC benefactor will be held in honour of the Father-General at the Spanish Embassy in Nigeria inside the residence of the Spanish Ambassador.

The Supreme Head of the Jesuits was born in Palencia , Spain in 1936 and began his theological studies at Sophia Jesuit University in Japan in 1964. He was ordained priest in 1967.

As an author, he has written two books in Japanese language. He has also done extensive studies about the challenges facing Christianity in Asia , immigration labourers and refuges among others.

Apart from English, he is fluent in Spanish, Japanese and several other European languages.

On 18 April Irish Aid organised a Volunteering Information Fair in Dublin. Liam O’Connell SJ represented Jesuit Volunteers International (JVI) and the Mission Office at the event, and he had interesting conversations with 48 of the 400 people who attended. These included past students from Jesuit schools, people who have just taken early retirement, husband and wife teams who want to volunteer, and those making plans for 2010. JVI are specifically looking for people to teach in a Jesuit primary school in Dodoma in Tanzania, starting in July, and people to teach English to adults in a Jesuit language school in Yangon, Myanmar starting in August 2009. For further details consult the JVI website.

GUATEMALA CITY (CNS) — In his first public announcement since winning El Salvador’s presidency, Mauricio Funes evoked the words of slain Archbishop Oscar A. Romero.

“Just as the martyr-bishop said the church of El Salvador could only have a preferential option for the poor, my presidency will have a preference for the vulnerable and the excluded,” Funes said in late March.

It was the second time he mentioned the country’s former archbishop in the days after winning the election. Catholic voters did not miss the symbolism. For them, Archbishop Romero’s name evokes an era when the church was an outspoken critic of the establishment.

Two decades ago, with the region plagued by civil war, church officials such as Archbishop Romero won international praise for questioning the tactics and policies of governments, at times putting themselves at risk. Archbishop Romero, who spoke out during El Salvador’s brutal civil war, became one of the war’s 75,000 victims when he was killed in 1980.

But he was not an anomaly. His successor, Archbishop Arturo Rivera Damas, Nicaragua’s Cardinal Miguel Obando Bravo, and Guatemala City’s former Auxiliary Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera etched their names into the region’s lore as candid religious leaders, observers said.

With Funes’ political party — born out of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front guerrillas — scheduled to take power in June and the Sandinistas again in control in Nicaragua, Central America’s politics recall the 1980s. But few see Catholic Church leaders returning to the role they played in that decade.

“I think what we’re seeing now, across the region, is a church in which, contrary to the 1980s, bishops are taking the middle road, saying ‘We want change, but we don’t want to go back to a time when people were getting killed,'” said Edward Brett, a professor of history at Catholic-run Laroche College in Pittsburgh.

Brett, who wrote a book about the church’s role in the 1980s political situation in Central America, recently returned from a fact-finding mission to the region.

“What I found was that many of the bishops still want and are pushing for change, reforms and better lives for the poor, but doing it more carefully than they had. They’re saying ‘We have to do this slowly and work within the system,'” he said.

Today, the region’s most prominent church leader is Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, Honduras. A globe-trotting, Honduran-born leader who speaks seven languages and was once believed to be on track for the papacy, Cardinal Rodriguez has spoken against poverty, the burden of foreign debt on developing countries, and the U.S. war in Iraq.

Cardinal Rodriguez is the best example of what U.S. Jesuit Father Dean Brackley, a professor of theology at the University of Central America in El Salvador, calls “solid leadership.”

His message “might not go as far as bishops once did, but the circumstances are now different,” Father Brackley said. “The prophetic church and the church of (the) poor and liberation theology has always been a minority. … Most people have been in the middle, and that’s more evident now.”

Guatemala and Nicaragua serve as examples of how the church has adapted.

In Guatemala, Bishop Gerardi criticized government actions during that country’s 36-year civil war, which ended in 1996. In 1998, after years of speaking out against human rights abuses, Bishop Gerardi delivered a truth commission report on the war. He was murdered two days later.

Today, the country is facing a different kind of struggle. More than half the population lives in poverty, and the United Nations says it has one of the world’s five-highest homicide rates for countries not at war, with an average of 17 murders per day.

Cardinal Rodolfo Quezada Toruno of Guatemala has taken up the issue by working closely with the president and federal prosecutor. The cardinal helped craft a security plan that will be announced later in April.

In Nicaragua, the Sandinistas, headed by Daniel Ortega, overthrew the dictatorship in 1979. Ortega became president in 1985. During those years, the church went from being supportive to being critical of his Sandinista movement.

Cardinal Obando Bravo, who retired in 2005, initially supported the Sandinistas, then became critical of their tactics. He once called Sandinistas proponents of “godless communism.”

Ortega again became president in 2007 and has set up similarly controversial programs. However, he has not drawn the same type of criticism from the current archbishop as he did in the 1980s.

Managua Archbishop Leopoldo Brenes Solorzano took a decidedly neutral stance during the last presidential elections and called on clergy not to participate in the political process.

“By not siding one way or the other, he was able to show that he’s a stabilizing force,” Father Brackley said. “In that sense, his influence is commendable. He’s been able to negotiate extremely difficult times.”

No place better exemplifies current church-state relations in Central America than El Salvador, where a president-elect and newly appointed archbishop are adjusting to their new roles.

“I think that the people in El Salvador hope for and even expect change now that they have elected a new president,” said Auxiliary Bishop Gregorio Rosa Chavez of San Salvador. “They have gone through many changes in the past 30 years. Now, there’s an opportunity for the church to work with the new government on social issues that affect the country.”

Leadership in El Salvador’s Catholic Church became increasingly less progressive after Archbishop Romero’s death. Although his successor, Archbishop Rivera, followed the slain archbishop’s message, he did so in a more muted tone.

Archbishop Rivera’s successor, Archbishop Fernando Saenz Lacalle, took the church in an entirely different direction. A Spaniard and member of Opus Dei, Archbishop Saenz was named to San Salvador in 1995 and worked well with the Nationalist Republican Alliance, or ARENA, whose candidate had won the presidency in 1989.

“We entered into a very cordial period then,” Bishop Rosa Chavez said. “It was much different from the 1980s.”

Archbishop Jose Escobar Alas, the son of a cattle rancher, succeeded Archbishop Saenz late last year. In his early days, Archbishop Escobar has shown signs of an independent streak.

The clergy is “very pleased with the way he has handled himself thus far. He’s been up to the vocation,” Father Brackley said. “Many people feel that the country is taking a positive turn with a new president, and this particular archbishop contributes to that positive feeling.”

A barometer for Father Brackley was how Archbishop Escobar handled the contentious presidential election. The archbishop’s role exemplified the more moderate approach Central American bishops have taken.

“The big difference between now and the ’80s is that we’re no longer at war,” said Father Brackley. “When we were at war, that provoked an outcry in any half-responsible person. But the deaths are slower and more silent. And people are much more likely to work within the system and alongside the government than to criticize it.”

BEIJING (UCAN) — The recent broadcasting over state-run television of a documentary on a 17th-century German missioner has pleasantly surprised mainland Chinese Catholics.

The program was first telecast on March 22 evening on China Central Television (CCTV). It featured Jesuit Father Johann Adam Schall von Bell (1591-1666), who made important contributions to research in science and astronomy in China, and also evangelized on the mainland.

The 36-minute documentary also highlighted how he acted as a bridge in fostering greater understanding between Eastern and Western cultures.

The program, produced by the Jesuit-run Kuangchi Program Service in Taiwan and Jiangsu Broadcasting Corporation in Nanjing, mainland China, was replayed in the morning and afternoon of March 23.

News of the screening spread rapidly through Catholic websites, chat rooms and group e-mails and generated excitement among Chinese Catholics, according to sources. Some lay Catholics also watched it online from the CCTV website.

Mary Sun, a Catholic in the northern Hebei province, said she did not know much about Father Schall, known as Tang Ruowang in Chinese, until she watched the program. “I feel proud that our Church had such a great missioner,” she said.

Sun added that the rare screening of a documentary on a religious figure in the communist country, where Christians are a minority, was a positive development. She felt that government could be doing this to ease tensions with the Vatican or affirm the positive contributions of Western missioners.

The program was part of the “Exploring” documentary series screened on CCTV Channel 10, which broadcasts mostly science and other educational programs.

Another layperson from Hebei, John Baptist Ma, said the CCTV program can be seen as indicative of the Chinese authorities’ willingness to “dialogue with the Church.” He added that he would record the program onto DVD and show it to his non-Catholic friends as a means of introducing them to the Catholic faith.

However, a college student from Beijing surnamed Zheng, said she was not at all surprised at the broadcast. “The Church teaches people good deeds,” said Zheng, who is not a Catholic. “The government should support it.”

Father Schall was born into a noble family in Cologne, Germany. He joined the Society of Jesus in 1611, and was later sent to China via Lisbon, Goa and Macau. He was admitted to the imperial court in Beijing in 1623, and helped Xu Guangqi, a Catholic and a senior official of the Ming Dynasty, reform the Chinese calendar. His knowledge of astronomy and mathematics is said to have won him great respect from the Chinese people.

He also did mission work in Beijing and Shaanxi province, and published several religious books. He died in Beijing at the age of 75, during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

This was not the first time a Catholic missioner has been featured on China television, however. In 2003, a listed TV company in mainland China produced a TV drama on Italian Jesuit Brother Joseph Castiglione (1688-1766), known as Lang Shining in Chinese, who worked more than 50 years for the Qing Dynasty emperors Kangxi and Yongzheng.

by LOYOLA PRESS on APRIL 2, 2009

Loyola Press invites you to join a unique online community of people who are willing to share their perspectives about Catholic life, spirituality, and faith. From time to time you will be invited to participate in brief online surveys. To join in register at www.SpiritedTalk.org.

Become a member and receive surveys regarding the products and services you use in relation to your life as a Catholic. You may also have the opportunity to evaluate new Loyola Press products and services before they are introduced. For joining SpiritedTalk.org, you will automatically be entered into a quarterly sweepstakes drawing for a $50 Amazon.com gift card. No need to worry about a long-term commitment; you may opt out at any time. We thank you for helping us serve the Catholic community. Join us at www.SpiritedTalk.org.

by LOYOLA PRESS on APRIL 2, 2009

Loyola Press invites you to join a unique online community of people who are willing to share their perspectives about Catholic life, spirituality, and faith. From time to time you will be invited to participate in brief online surveys. To join in register at www.SpiritedTalk.org.

Become a member and receive surveys regarding the products and services you use in relation to your life as a Catholic. You may also have the opportunity to evaluate new Loyola Press products and services before they are introduced. For joining SpiritedTalk.org, you will automatically be entered into a quarterly sweepstakes drawing for a $50 Amazon.com gift card. No need to worry about a long-term commitment; you may opt out at any time. We thank you for helping us serve the Catholic community. Join us at www.SpiritedTalk.org.

by LOYOLA PRESS on APRIL 2, 2009

James Martin, SJ, has been announced as the winner of the 2009 Writer’s Award in Spirituality.  This award is given by the Loyola Institute for Spirituality at the Hearts on Fire Celebration.  The Writer’s Award in Spirituality is awarded to a person who demonstrates excellence in furthering the spiritual teachings of St. Ignatius of Loyola through his or her writings.  James Martin, SJ, is the author of several Loyola Press books including My Life with the Saints and A Jesuit Off-Broadway.

The Hearts of Fire Celebration is an annual dinner and fundraiser that offers the Loyola Institute for Spirituality a chance to celebrate their ministry and honor contributors.  The dinner is April 25, 2009 at the Double Tree Guest Suites at the Anaheim Resort/Convention Center.  Along with Fr. Martin’s award, Bishop Gordon Bennet, SJ, will be honored with the Hearts on Fire Award and Mr. and Mrs. Eleuterio and Linda Rodriguez will be honored with the Rosita Diaz Award.  For more information about the 2009 Hearts on Fire Celebration, please visit the Loyola Institute for Spirituality’s website.