On the Threshold of Religious Life: an Interview with Jesuit Novice Erik Sorensen

By John O’Brien, S.J. 

Erik Sorensen is in the final days of the first phase of Jesuit formation known as novitiate. For two years, he has been studying, praying and embarking on experiences known as “experiments”, all designed by St. Ignatius of Loyola to test the candidate and help him grow in his vocation. Erik, 24, will be professing vows of perpetual poverty, chastity and obedience on August 17, 2014. 

Erik, tell us a little bit about yourself and your family background. 
I grew up in Red Deer, Alberta with my parents and two younger sisters.  Ever since I was young, I have been interested in aviation. This interest led me to get both my pilots license and a Bachelors Degree in Aerospace Engineering. 

What brought to the doorstep of the Jesuit novitiate? 
During my years in high school, I entertained the thought of being a priest. But I was never super serious about it because I was so intrigued by my passion for aviation and I was unable, at the time, to reconcile these ideas.

[Not] Seeing the Face of Christ in the Homeless

By Artur Suski, S.J.

a-revolt.org

Three weeks in the Paris of North America. Three weeks contemplating the suffering and rejected Christ. Three weeks of soul-searching.

Though a Jesuit’s summer is often full of Jesuit-formation activities, such as making one’s own eight-day retreat and attending formation gatherings, there are chunks of time that often lend themselves to creativity. I had three weeks at my disposal and I decided to make good use of them. I have been the last three weeks in Montreal, volunteering at a well-established (since 1877) soup kitchen and shelter – Accueil Bonneau.

My initial decision was simply to come to Montreal in order to polish my French. Not really knowing how to go about doing this in a most effective way, I asked some French Canadian Jesuits for some suggestions. After a few email exchanges it was decided that I’d have lots of French conversation at a soup kitchen. Hence Accueil Bonneau.

Learning the “John the Baptist Style”

By Edmund Lo, S.J.

Photo: Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

My fellow brother Jesuits have written previously about the Jesuit-led young adult retreat called Hearts on Fire (HoF), where the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola is introduced. We had the opportunity to bring HoF to Regina, Saskatchewan this past weekend, where I found myself in the unique position of being both on the Jesuit retreat team and the local host.

I have always enjoyed running retreats. It gives me a concrete sense that I am not someone who serenades the retreatants with eloquent speeches, nor gives them a substantial lecture of how to understand God on a rigorously intellectual level. I am merely preparing them, so that they be prepared for an encounter with the Lord in their prayer and reflection periods. As many know, this kind of encounter can be wildly unpredictable, yet immensely fruitful. Couple this with taking care of the details behind the scene to ensure that the retreatants be physically well-disposed, and I have a strong sense of what the mission of St. John the Baptist feels like: “prepare the way of the Lord, then get out of the way”.

The Heroic Life of Campion

By Michael Knox, S.J.

Image: www.campionschool.in

Around the world today we celebrate the life and death of Jesuit priest St. Edmund Campion who was, in 1970, declared a saint and martyr of the Roman Catholic Church by Pope Paul VI.  Born into prosperity, and having read at St. John’s College, Oxford, at the age of seventeen Campion successfully embarked on what, by all accounts, was a sensational career honouring two successive queens of England with his well-known oration, while at the same time receiving praise from both his students and powerful patrons among the English aristocracy. It is said, however, that in his heart, the then young deacon of the Church of England, was deeply drawn to the Roman Catholic faith, and for this reason left England in 1569.  After a brief time in Ireland as a private tutor, Campion embraced the Church while on pilgrimage in France, and then walked to Rome, where in 1573 he was admitted to the Society of Jesus.  After just over five years of training, Campion was ordained a priest, then took a post lecturing in rhetoric and moral philosophy at the Jesuit college in Prague.

We Don't Struggle Alone: The lives of two Jesuit brothers

By Br. Daniel Leckman, S.J.

http://fatherdoyle.files.wordpress.com

This week we celebrated the life and martyrdom of an Irish Jesuit brother, Blessed Dominic Collins and the simplicity and holiness of a universally-celebrated, Spanish Jesuit brother, St Alfonso Rodriguez. Within this context, I couldn’t resist looking at their lives to see what it is about them that informs and inspires our own lives as Jesuits and the lives of so many of God's people. This exercise also gave me the opportunity to contemplate the Brother’s vocation in the twenty-first century and everything it may entail!

Let’s start with Brother Alfonso. His vocation story was one marred with a lot of suffering. He once was happily married and had three children. Then, within five years, he witnessed the death of each member of his family due to the same illness. His response to these events was one that exhibited great character. He did not blame God for his loss, nor did he become a bitter old man. Instead, he turned his grief into meditation, into prayer. He was around 40 when he entered the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) as a lay brother.

A New Saint: Kateri, A Witness to Beauty

By Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

Credit: www.forums.catholic.com

There is something exciting about celebrating the canonization of a new saint. Yesterday, His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI canonized seven new saints; a Jesuit and two others with Jesuit connections were among this group. They are Saint Jacques Berthieu, a French Jesuit missionary; Saint Peter Calungsod, a lay Catholic from Cebu, Philippines who travelled with Jesuit missionaries; and Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, who became the first Native American saint.

How at Age 50 I entered the Society of Jesus and Never Looked Back

By Henk Van Meijel, S.J.

There is an old folk saying: If you want to make God laugh then tell God your plans for life. Each one of us has an image of ourselves which represents some aspects of our true being. Proper discernment for whatever one undertakes in life is thus important. First, one naturally has to pray and reflect, but also confide this to spiritual persons, for the simple fact that a spiritual director will see dimensions about ourselves that we cannot perceive. As a teenager in the Netherlands during the late sixties and early seventies I did feel a religious calling, but there was no one around with whom I could talk to about this. In time this calling seemingly died out. During this period, as in North America, the Church was in a great flux which caused many to leave religious life, and only a scant few to enter. I married and had three children.

Martyrdom: Testifying to Love

canadianmartyrsparish.ca

This homily was preached at the Martyr's Shrine in Midland by Fr. Peter Bisson, Provincial of the Jesuits in English Canada, on Saturday, September 22, 2012, for the Feast of the Canadian Martyrs. The actual feast was celebrated this past Wednesday.

Thee hundred and sixty three years ago, here in this place, Christ did a new thing in North America. Just as His own identity was fully revealed in His death and resurrection, so too was His life made manifest here in the lives and deaths of Sts. Jean de Brebeuf, Isaac Jogues, Gabriel Lalement, Noel Chabanel, Antoine Daniel, Rene Goupil, Jean de LaLande, as well as in the lives and commitments of their Huron and French companions. True life and true human flourishing - which is to be a friend of God's - is to be found only through the death that is to give yourself away in love.

This is the message that has attracted you here!

Leading Us to God: The Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite

By Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, S.J.

(credit: Catholic Knight Blog)

Pope Benedict XVI issued a decree in July, 2007 concerning the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, called by many either the traditional Latin mass or the Tridentine liturgy. He explained that the ancient liturgy of the Church, normative for more than a thousand years until Pope Paul VI released the new missal in 1970, had never been abrogated. Rather, he claimed, the old mass was such an important part of Catholic tradition that it “must be given due honour for its venerable and ancient usage.”

The Spirit of Faith and Joy

By Eric Hanna, S. J.

I left Maracaibo, near Venezuela's northern coast, early in the morning and set out with my hosts in the direction of the Colombian border. We were heading for an area near the Rio Limon, home to a branch of Venezuela's indigenous people: the Wayuu. My trip's destination was a primary school run by a Jesuit education organization called Fe y Alegría (faith and joy).

The journey took about an hour and a half. The landscape slowly transitioned from dense forests into flat, white plains of sandy soil. We rolled past copses of hardy, dry trees and herds of skinny cows. After crossing the bridge over the wide, rolling river we quickly arrived at the school. It is a school for the children of the Wayuu community, composed of a few hundred students from grades one to six.

Jesus in the Streets of San Antonio

By John O'Brien, S. J.

Two miles west of San Antonio's downtown is Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church. Serving a largely Latino population, the parish is a haven in the sun-baked streets of this lower-income neighborhood. Its air-conditioned church sanctuary and parish office are open all day, and local people drop in to pray or have their holy objects blessed by the resident pastors.

In adjacent buildings, an adoration chapel is open until midnight and teams of women spend hours making rosaries in a pleasant room – well-stocked with coffee and tasty delights – which are sent all over the country. Recently, a Hearts on Fire retreat took place with more than eighty young adults attending. Not long ago, this Jesuit parish had become somewhat derelict, but today it is evident that its devotional life is alive and well.

Impressions from Venezuela III

By Adam Hincks, S.J.

We are now past our half-way mark here in Venezuela, and I feel, to some degree, ‘settled in’. So instead of chronicling our doings over the past fortnight, I shall begin with a theme that I hinted at before but did not elaborate: Venezuelan politics.

‘They Will be Divided’

Most of us could probably only name a handful of the heads-of-state around the world, but Hugo Chavéz would almost certainly be among them. Naturally, before coming to Venezuela, I was curious to visit the country he leads (or rules?). And, as fate would have it, he landed in Caracas at almost the same time we did back in May, returning from medical treatment in Cuba. As we drove through the night streets of the city, we could hear the live reports of his arrival on the radio.

Impressions from Venezuela

By Adam Hincks, S.J.

Two weeks ago, I arrived, together with two companions from my community in Toronto ― Daniel and Eric ― in Caracas, Venezuela. We are here to study Spanish and to be immersed in a different culture. There is an informal twinning between the Jesuits of Venezuela and English Canada by which we send each other men for language studies. Fittingly, we are staying in the Philosophate, i.e., the house of our Venezuelan counterparts who are studying philosophy. Apart from the superior and a theologian, there are about ten young Jesuits scholastics here. This provides for a lively environment and plenty of opportunity to converse in the local language. Meanwhile, our hosts have hired a tutor for formal language lessons; we are at it for a total of four to six hours a day during the week, not including homework, making for a truly intensive experience.

I have had the privilege of spending time in several different countries over my life and in recent years got into the habit of writing down my impressions and experiences to share with others. I kept a daily, online journal during my visits to the Atacama Desert of Chile, and last year, when I was in Nairobi, sent around a bi-weekly newsletter by electronic mail. This time around, I have decided to use the new-fangled ‘blog’ (viz., ‘web-log’) technology. I plan to make posts here at Ibo roughly fortnightly.

What Makes a Jesuit Heart Beat? The Little Happiness: Principle and Foundation

By Fr. Peter Bisson, S.J.

Fr. Bisson, the Provincial Superior of the Jesuits in English Canada, gave this speech on Saturday, May 12th, 2012, for the closing ceremony of the 400th Anniversary of the Jesuits in Canada. This text and the song were translated from the French originals by Santiago Rodriguez, S.J. 

The vision of God and of the world that inspires the Society of Jesus, and those who share this vision, is expressed in part by these lines from Félix Leclerc:

It's a little joy

That I had gathered

It was all in tears

On the edge of a ditch

When it saw me passing by

It began to shout out

"Sir, pick me up

And bring me to your place

My brothers have forgotten me, I’m fallen, I'm sick

If you don't pick me up I'll die; what a shame!

I'll make myself small, tender and obedient, I promise

Sir, I'm begging you, free me of my torture

Sur, I'm begging you, free me of my torture.”

A Jesuit on Mars

By Eric Hanna, S.J.

I think I'd like to be
A Jesuit on Mars
To soar through that black, airless sea

And evangelize the stars



Perhaps some child of the red sands

Awaits the Word of God

They'll gape in amazement as I land

In my ecclesial space pod

Jesuits of English Canada

By the blog editors

Last summer, the Jesuits who belong to the Province of English Canada, together with a number of their lay collaborators and a delegation of Jesuits from the French Canada Province, came together with Fr. Adolfo Nicolas, the Father General of the Society of Jesus, for a congress in Midland, Ontario. The occasion was the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first Jesuits in Canada, and to pray, discern, and discuss directions for the future.

A short video was recently released that conveys the highlights of that historic gathering. It also provides a certain glimpse of the Jesuits in Canada today:

A Jesuit Journey: Re-Imagining Our Mission

By Eric Hanna, S.J.

Imagination is a gift from God and a cornerstone of Ignatian Spirituality …

… but at times our imagination needs to be purified.