Appointments

Father General has appointed:

• – Fr George Cela Carvajal President of the Conference of Latin America Provincials. He was born in Cuba in 1941, entered the Society in 1959, was ordained a priest in 1970 and was Superior of the Cuba Region since 2010. He has worked for several years in the Dominican Republic, and was Director of the International Federation Fe y Alegria.

From the Provinces

ASIA-PACIFIC: Forming Jesuits for Asia-Pacific

The Jesuit Conference of Asia-Pacific has released a detailed document on the formation of Jesuits for its part of the world. It is entitled “Forming a Contemplative in Action: A Profile of a Formed Jesuit for Asia Pacific”. The document addresses three major questions – What does a formed Jesuit look like? What specific issues does initial formation need to address? What competencies does a formed Jesuit for Asia-Pacific need to have mastered? The Profile was prepared by a special Committee. The Committee stresses that the Profile is not intended as a one-size-fits-all approach to Jesuit formation, as the Society has always attracted a mix of personalities. Our formation process aims to help a scholastic or brother in formation to recognize and affirm his unique talents, and to develop them further in the service of apostolic mission. The Profile details the fundamentals for a contemplative in action – the Committee says that the Jesuit in formation finds himself at the centre of six interrelated dynamics. If he is open to these, they have the potential to form him as a contemplative in action. The six dynamics are interiority, psychosexual and affective integration, conversation, critical thinking, a universal perspective and discerned action. The Committee recognized that the Asia-Pacific Conference is more diverse than other Assistances, with significant differences in language, culture and experience. It acknowledged that the particularities of formation should appropriately be sorted out at the provincial or regional level. The document can be downloaded from the Jesuit Conference of Asia Pacific website at: http://sjapc.net/what-we-do/forming-contemplative-action-profile-formed-jesuit-asia-pacific.

AUSTRALIA: A Doorway to Indigenous Leadership

The name of the new Aboriginal Studies Centre opened in St. Ignatius’ College at Riverview is Yennibeu, which means “coming together to become one, respect and caring for each other, a unification of spirit.” The Centre wants to strengthen the college’s commitment to the education of young indigenous men and the promotion of indigenous culture. Yennibeu will serve as a research centre and classroom for year 11 and 12 aboriginal studies students. According to Kurt Bartelme, Riverview’s Aboriginal Studies teacher in charge of the centre, this year has seen the largest aboriginal studies class in the last 10 years with 18 boys in the program. Both the name and the location of the centre hold great significance. The name “indicates a need to understand the complexity of language and culture and our commitment with our indigenous brothers. The location is on the top floor, and this is very symbolic for the importance placed on Aboriginal Studies.” The opening of Yennibeu adds another marker in the timeline of Riverview’s Indigenous program. Starting with a generous bursary in the 1990s, the school began a bursary program which provides indigenous boys the advantage of a Jesuit education. Today, indigenous boarders make up 1.8% of the school’s total population – coincidentally the same proportion of indigenous people living in Australian society.

BANGLADESH: Great Success for “MAGIS Bangla Camp”

The 350 applicants for the 72 places at the Magis Bangla Camp (MAGIS means “Marching and Growing in Solidarity”), show that the movement is getting ever more popular. Magis Bangla Camp is the annual camp of a new Catholic youth movement run by Jesuits in Bangladesh. During the camp, which was held in Baromari (Mymensingh diocese) from November 8^th to 12^th, conventional classroom-type activities made way for practical learning experiences, such as bonding sessions, meditation, swimming, craftwork and sports. This alternative approach to youth formation focuses on the physical, mental and spiritual changes in young people. It helps them observe life more closely and learn from experiences so that they may be more successful in their future careers. Camp members were also expected to carry out daily domestic chores, including the cooking and cleaning. At the end of the camp participants said that it was a great experience and they learned many things there. Here is the comment of one of them: “I’ve participated in diocese and national level youth gatherings which were boring since we were stuck in a classroom most of the time. Here we’ve learned practical skills, to be real human beings and to respect one another.”

CHINA: Oratorio tribute to Matteo Ricci

The Guangqi Music School Choir of Shanghai diocese has just completed its first tour, performing an oratorio production that depicts the life of the revered Italian Jesuit, Father Matteo Ricci (1552-1610). From November 4 to 6, the 50-strong choir performed at Nanmen and Longgang churches in Wenzhou diocese, and the Assumption Cathedral in Ningbo diocese. Wu Jiagong, the school principal and a noted expert in Chinese sacred music, explained that the eight-part oratorio is still a work in progress. “The composition, in both classical and contemporary Chinese, was started last year and so far only four acts have been completed. It is a huge project involving many people,” he said. “Like many Italian and Chinese Catholics, I have prayed for the canonization of Father Ricci and his closest Chinese friend, Xu Guangqi, who was the first Catholic in Shanghai.” Wu added: “composing oratorios for the two sages has always been a wish of mine. I hope to promote the deeds of the two early Church figures through music, to encourage local Catholics to learn from them.”

COLOMBIA: 40 Years of Fe y Alegría

During 2011, Fe y Alegría Colombia held various religious, educational, sport and cultural events in different regions of the country. This was to mark the 40^thanniversary of its work in Colombia, providing primary and formal education, and promoting of social justice through its programs. Each event provided an opportunity for local personalities, teachers, students and families of the centers of Fe y Alegría to celebrate its activities. Father José María Vélaz, S.J. founded the movement and provided it with principles which have made possible a significant improvement in the quality of the education received by children and young people in the poorer areas of the country. Fe y Alegría helps them to work towards the construction of a more just, equitable, and inclusive society.

ITALY: More on Brother Pozzo

On the occasion of the 300^th anniversary of the death of Andrea Pozzo (30^thOctober 1642 – 31^st August 1709), two important initiatives have been held in recent years. One of them was organized by the Pontifical Gregorian University and the Austrian Historical Institute, in conjunction with the Bibliotheca Hertziana and Max-Planck Institute. It was an exhibition held from the 3^rd March to the 3^rdMay 2010, and a congress that took place from 18^th to 20^th November 2009. The documents of the congress were presented in a publication launched on November 23^rd 2011 at the Austrian Historical Institute. The volume collects the presentations of the speakers at the congress, all of whom were experts from renowned national and international academic institutions. They analyzed the complex artistic work of Pozzo under various headings, offering new insights and interesting reflections which will help future documentary research and criticism. Andrea Pozzo can surely be considered one of the most extraordinary artists of European baroque. His work ranges from painting, to architecture, and to “sacred scenography”. He was also a theoretician on perspective and color, and he wrote one of the most famous works in this field: the two large illustrated volumesPerspectiva pictorum et architectorum (Rome 1693/1700).

ROME: New Resources for JRS Service

To commemorate the thirty-first anniversary of the foundation of the organization, the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) announced the launch of a new section of its website: Theology, spirituality and ethics, as a basis of the JRS mission. “Surrounded by mindless violence, war and displacement, it is hard to make sense of it all.  It seems so meaningless and can lead us to despair. That is why we have launched this new initiative, to give ethical and spiritual meaning to our work”, said JRS International Director, Peter Balleis S.J.. The new section explores the key issues facing JRS staff in their service and advocacy work with refugees and other forcibly displaced migrants. It focuses on serving faith, promoting justice and enhancing inter-religious understanding, while also placing emphasis on how best JRS can, in the words of the Superior General of the Jesuits, Adolfo Nicolás, foster reconciliation and Gospel hospitality. In addition to providing theological, spiritual and ethical resources to assist better those working in this challenging ministry, the papers seek to promote understanding of how JRS shapes its project and advocacy agenda as an Ignatian faith-based organization. For more information:www.jrs.net

ROME: Office for Development

The first year’s activity of the pilot project to establish development offices in four Provinces – Philippines (Asia-Pacific, JCAP), Madhya Pradesh (South Asia, JCSA), Malta (Europe, CEP) and East Africa (Africa and Madagascar, JESAM) – ended with a seminar on formation in planning, management, and the presentation of accounts. This was held at the end of November in Nairobi, Kenya. Its participants were the directors of apostolic works of the Provinces of East Africa (Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia and Sudan). Given the differences in history, culture and current situation, each of the pilot projects travelled an individual path. But each of them centered on the collection of funds locally, on the support they receive from other Provinces, and on international cooperation. These new Offices for Development seem to strengthen the relationship between our benefactors (“companions in the mission”) and the sustainability of our apostolic mission in the different regions. In 2012, the Office of the Assistant Treasurer for Development Resources (ATDR its acronym in English) will help to establish a Development Office in the Indonesian Province, selected by the Provincials of Asia Pacific Assistancy. The Philippines Development Office will support this venture by offering what it has learnt in the past year.

SPAIN:  The Universidad Loyola Andalucía becomes a reality

On November 23^rd the Parliament of Andalusia approved the reform of the law for universities under which the Universidad Loyola Andalucía officially becomes the first private university of the region. The Universidad Loyola Andalucía is sponsored by the Society of Jesus, and academically part of ETEA, the Faculty of Economic and Business Sciences of the University of Cordoba. In the 2013-2014 academic year, it will begin courses in Business, Economic, Law, Political and Social Sciences, Communication, Education and Engineering at its two bases in Cordoba and Seville. The president of Insa-ETEA and of the Universidad Loyola AndalucíaFoundation, Fr. Ildefonso Camacho, said: “This is very good news, because it confirms an andalusian project for the world . . . Loyola aims to be a university for everybody, open to anyone who wants to study and to be trained in it, in which no social or economic differences to be an obstacle.” One of the main features of the project is its support of the Society of Jesus. This was demonstrated, at the one hand, by its highest representative, the superior general Adolfo Nicolás. He was in Seville some weeks ago to visit the Province and to meet Felipe Benjumea, president of Abengoa, and other top representatives of the project. On the other hand, the rector of the Loyola University in Chicago, Fr. Michael Garanzini, who is responsible for Jesuit universities all over the world, was also in Seville less than a month ago to strongly support the project.

Jesuitica

Starting Cities. In January 1554, Fathers Joseph de Anchieta (now Blessed) and de Nobrega established a mission and school at a small village in Brazil. They celebrated the first Mass there on the feast of the conversion of St Paul, so they called the place São Paulo. São Paulo is now the 7th largest city in the world, with a population of 18,850,000. In 1567 the same pair founded a settlement in what is now Rio de Janeiro, the world’s 22nd biggest city with 10,560,000 people. Two Brazilian cities carry his name. Joseph wrote the first dramas in Brazil in Latin, Portuguese and Tupi (an Indian language), so he is named Father of Brazilian literature. He wrote a famous poem to the Virgin Mary, allegedly writing it every morning on the wet sand of a beach and committing it to memory until he could much later transcribe its more than 4,000 verses to paper (AMDG Express). 

In the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius Loyola often urges us to “pray for what you want.” Here’s a short talk from a TED conference about doing that. The speaker talks about praise, gratitude, and saying “thank you.” (Click here if you can’t see the video.) 

by Jim Manney

Larry Gillick, SJ is a special Jesuit. Blind since childhood, he has been a Jesuit for 50 years and has had a varied and fruitful career. Among other accomplishments, he is one of the authors of Retreat in the Real World, a popular adaptation of the Spiritual Exercises. He does retreat work all over the US, and lives in the Jesuit community at Creighton University.

In this video, he talks about how God called him to be a priest. (Click here to watch it on YouTube.)

When John Endres, S.J., and Julia Prinz, V.D.M.F., traveled to Asia in 2009 with a delegation from the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, they were not sure to expect. Their trip gave them unique insights into the lives of their students, in particular women religious, who travel from the Pacific Rim to study theology in Berkeley. They witnessed women working closely with the poor and practicing a theology that grew from the culture. Sr. Prinz and Fr. Endres recently spoke about their journey at a “Theology in the City” lecture sponsored by JSTB. Pictured above: novices of the Daughters of St. Anne, in Ranchi, Jharkanland, India. Photograph courtesy of the Verbum Dei Missionary Fraternity.

Kerry Weber considers what gifts we can offer to one another, and to Christ, this Advent season.

by Tom McGrath

One year during Advent, our parish priest invited us to write down on a slip of paper a word that named something that is keeping us from getting closer to God. He suggested it might be a fear, a resentment, or an attitude that shuts us off from the love God so wants to give. We were to fold the paper over a few times, grasp it tightly in one hand, and make a fist around it while he began to preach on the Scripture readings.

After a minute, my hand began to ache. At two minutes, my hand grew numb. At three minutes, the hand started shaking uncontrollably. He told us to open our hands. I found how hard it was to do that. After grasping the piece of paper so tightly, my hand had stiffened and seemed to have a mind of its own.

I can’t remember what else he said that day, but I have never forgotten that lesson. Hold on to a resentment, fear, or bad attitude long enough and you will become paralyzed.

As I begin Advent every year now, I start with the realization that I need to let go of any and all spiritual impediments I’m hanging onto. Advent is a time of receiving. It’s hard to receive if your hands are clasped shut. So I begin Advent once again with this prayer: Holy Spirit of God, open my hands, my eyes, my ears, all my senses, and all of my heart so I will be ready to receive your Advent blessings.

And then I sit there in the Advent darkness, my hands open before me, waiting on God.

 Jim Manney

“Magis” is an important concept in Ignatian spirituality. It is the Latin word for the greater or the best. It captures the thirst for excellence that Ignatius wanted to foster in those who seek to serve God.

What does “magis” really mean? That’s the question Paul Coutinho asks in this talk. Specifically, he asks whether it means doing more or being more.

Magis: Doing More or Being More? from SLU Mission & Ministry on Vimeo.

by Paul Brian Campbell, SJ 

“What is the highest act a person can perform?”

“Sitting in meditation.”

But the Master himself was rarely seen to sit in meditation. He was ceaselessly engaged in housework and fieldwork, in meeting people and writing books. He even took up the bookkeeping chores of the monastery.

“Why then, do you spend all your time in work”?

“When one works, one need not cease to sit in meditation.”

by Paul Brian Campbell, SJ 

For all his holiness, the Master seemed vaguely opposed to religion. This never ceased to puzzle the disciples who, unlike the Master, equated religion with spirituality.

“Religion as practiced today deals in punishments and rewards. In other words, it breeds fear and greed – the two things most destructive of spirituality.”

Later he added ruefully, “It is like tackling a flood with water; or a burning barn with fire.”

By James Martin, S.J. 

I have been both astonished and moved by the tremendous outpouring of emotion over the death of Steve Jobs, at age 56. Mr. Jobs, as is known by anyone whose fingers ever touched a computer or held an iPhone, was a dazzlingly talented innovator who, as President Obama noted, will likely rank among the greatest of American inventors.

Still, there have been many other gifted public figures -political leaders, business tycoons, philanthropists, researchers, scientists, writers, entertainers and inventors of other sorts- whose deaths did not touch such a chord. Obituaries of Mr. Jobs have appeared in almost every newspaper, magazine and (of course) website; television news programs devoted hours to covering his legacy; Facebook was promptly filled with impromptu photos, collages and tributes; nearly everyone on Twitter had something to say; and the Apple store in New York City is taking on the look of a shrine.
Some of these reactions may have to do with Mr. Jobs’ appeal to an age demographic that has grown up entirely in the digital age, an era that the Apple innovator helped to usher in. And some of the sadness is no doubt prompted by the age at which he died: 56 is still young, even to the young.

But this is only part of the story. As someone who has written on the saints, I found that the coverage of his death, and the way his life is being retold, seemed oddly familiar. Why did people’s reactions -photos of candles posted on Facebook pages; cartoons with Mr. Jobs speaking to St. Peter at the Pearly Gates; flowers laid before Apple stores- remind me of what happens following the death of a saint? Why did the coverage in most venues seem, for want of a better word, worshipful? A few reasons suggest themselves, and a few intersections between the life of Mr. Jobs and the lives of the saints seem apparent. And no, before we continue: I’m not suggesting that he was a saint. But consider…

1.) He was a visionary. Anyone who could create, almost singlehandedly, the Mac, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad, possessed what we commonly call great “vision.” But of course this is the precise language used for the gifts of the mystics. In the Christian tradition, people like St. Bernadette Soubirous, the 19th-century young woman who saw apparitions of the Virgin Mary in the town of Lourdes, are called “visionaries.” Often, admirers of the visionary are drawn not only to the vision itself (in one case, a glimpse of the divine; in the other, the promise of instant communication); we are also drawn to the person himself or herself, who offers the possibility that mortals can “see” in new ways. Christian mystics are granted visions of -depending on the saint- Jesus, God the Father or Mary: rare entrees into a world most of us cannot “access.” They are revered for this privilege, marking them as one of the elect. The one who sees calls to our desire to see more.

2.) He was the object of a cult. By this I don’t mean the common definition of a “cult” (a group of crazies surrounding an even crazier leader). Rather, the “cult” that surrounds the saint (and that is the term used) is simply a group of admirers who follow carefully the saint’s teachings, study his or life and meditate on his or her writings. After Mr. Jobs’s death, I asked a friend who works for a large website to explain the seemingly outsized reactions, and he pointed to the devoted consumers who followed Apple’s latest rollouts, religiously, as it were. This kind of “cult” is not too far from the lives of the saints, in which their every utterance and act is eagerly anticipated. During their lifetimes, cults grew up around figures like Padre Pio, the 20th-century stigmatic from Italy, as well as more recent holy persons like Mother Teresa and Pope John Paul II. Something in us responds to the charismatic figure; something in us wants to “follow” that person’s words, thoughts or, in the case of Mr. Jobs, his creations.

3.) He was unique. The radical personality who bucks the system is a key feature of the lives of the saints, and is often deeply attractive to us, perhaps because it underlines the value of our individuality. One of the most widely quoted of Mr. Jobs comments was an encouragement to reject “dogma.” “Think Different,” was Apple’s famous motto.

Ironically, many of the great Christian saints clung to dogma, which is not quite as restrictive as Mr. Jobs might have suspected. Dogma, or a codified system of belief, can be not only liberating but an engine of individuality. Mother Teresa, for example, (now Blessed Teresa of Calcutta) left her old religious order and way of life to found a new one, the Missionaries of Charity, which served the “poorest of the poor” in Calcutta. But first she had to win over her former religious superior, her bishop and the Vatican. At first those in authority resisted, but she won them over by, in effect, inviting them to “think different.” The most recently canonized American saint, Mother Theodore Guerin, foundress of the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods, faced opposition from her local bishop (who threatened ejecting her from her own religious order) before she was able to attain autonomy in 19th century Indiana. In their uniqueness, often won at a high price in the face of the “status quo,” the saints remind us of the inherent human dignity of the individual. As the Catholic theologian Karl Rahner said, the saint shows us what it means to be a Christian in this particular way. Or in this different way.

4.) He was human. Apparently, Steve Jobs was not the easiest person to work with. Nor was he always kind. The New York Times noted his asperity when dealing with Apple’s competitor, Microsoft, “The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste,” he said. “They have absolutely no taste. And I don’t mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way, in the sense that they don’t think of original ideas, and they don’t bring much culture into their products.” Sometimes the saint is loved not simply for his closeness to God but for his patent humanity. The saint has a temper, flies off the handle, loses his or her cool in pursuit of a great ideal. St. Jerome, the first translator of the Bible into Latin, was famously irascible, once writing that one of his detractors “walked like a tortoise.” To take another example, St. Peter is beloved not only because he was a great apostle, but for his many flaws: denying Jesus three times before the crucifixion, among them. Holiness makes its home in humanity. That insight says, “They’re not perfect. Maybe I could aspire to this level of achievement.”

5.) He gave us something we didn’t know we needed. Saints offered their followers something new: an innovative way to follow God in a particular place and time. Some saints show their admirers new ways to pray, or new modes to serve the poor or, more broadly, new ways to live out the Gospel. The founders of the great religious orders all did this in one way or another. They met a need that they were able to identify with more clarity than those around them. Mr. Jobs, clearly, offered what consumers needed: Apple’s revenues show that. And he did so, apparently, with no market research. The customer, he said, does not know what he needs. Likewise, no one in the 14th century knew that the Catholic church needed a group of men and women entirely devoted to poverty, until St. Francis of Assisi stepped onto the world stage.

6.) He was mysterious. Like many of the saints, Steve Jobs showed a youthful precocity that would not only serve him well in later life but marked him as a remarkable individual at an early age. The lives of the saints are filled with legendary stories of youthful promise: St. Nicholas of Myra, in the fourth century, is said to have stood up in the baptismal font while still an infant-and, in some retellings, preached a homily! Such stories create an air of mystery surrounding the person.

Later, Mr. Jobs kept the public at bay, offering only rare glimpses of his private life, particularly in later years. This made his rare public appearances -for example, during the launch of a new Apple products- more exciting. Many of the saints, though human, seem removed from us. Their life of prayer, their inner life, always remains something of a mystery.

7.) He was, in his own way, a spiritual man. In the end, Mr. Jobs’ appeal may be closer to that of the saints than we might think. “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me,” he said. That quote could have come from many of the lives of the saints. And in his Stanford University commencement speech in 2005, he spoke explicitly on a topic that even some religious leaders avoid today: death. “No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share.” Here is one clear intersection between the saint and Mr. Jobs: he spoke about spiritual matters.

By no means-to quote St. Paul–am I suggesting that Steve Jobs was a saint. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum, as they say, but a few who worked with him have spoken of his less-than-saintly actions. Yet for those scratch their heads at the online tributes, the lives of the saints can help explain the powerful appeal of this creative genius. Likewise, the grief over Mr. Jobs’s passing may explain to those more familiar with iPhones than icons something about the appeal of the saints.