Appetite for Convenience

By Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

Credit: www.thinkstockphotos.com

I am on the road again. Being part of the Jesuit Mission Band means travelling, driving from one city to the next, and moving from a Jesuit community to a hotel and vice versa. Being on the road implies living out of a backpack or a suitcase, having a different schedule every day, and dining out very often. At times, all of this leaves me out of sync, exposed, and a bit vulnerable. Without the stability and structure of a routine and a more consistent schedule, I feel like an octopus on roller-blades. When it comes to planning my meals, I never know what the next meal will look like. As days go by on our retreat tour, I find myself going for what is convenient, trying to be sensitive to the culinary preferences of others, and losing the self-restraint not to binge on a bag of Tostitos forty-five minutes after we’ve had lunch.

Head or Heart: The Art and Science of Decision-Making

By Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

Credit: http://weheartit.com

I first listened to Christina Perri’s Jar of Hearts a few years ago. I have been a big fan of her music ever since. In April, Christina will release a new album titled Head or Heart. Since announcing her new release, her Facebook page has featured funny memes portraying the never-ending fight between the head and the heart. While the memes are very witty, I think they are based on a misunderstanding.

Knowing God’s Will: First Steps

By Adam Hincks, S.J.

If you ask me what you are to do in order to be perfect, I say, first – Do not lie in bed beyond the due time of rising; give your first thoughts to God; make a good visit to the Blessed Sacrament; say the Angelus devoutly; eat and drink to God’s glory; say the Rosary well; be recollected; keep out bad thoughts; make your evening meditation well; examine yourself daily; go to bed in good time, and you are already perfect. 
– Bl. John Henry Newman

St. Ignatius of Loyola would often close his letters with the prayer that he and his correspondent would have the grace to know God’s will and the strength to carry it out. He is by no means alone in this prayer. I suspect that most Christians often petition God for guidance about what to do in concrete situations. And yet, it is easy to fall into the trap of believing that discovering God’s will requires advanced spiritual experience or that it is the domain of mystical gurus. This can lead to a dilemma: we feel that we ought to seek for God’s will in our lives—whether it be for big, life decisions or small, everyday decisions—but at the same time we can feel that we do not have the spiritual know-how to get there. As a consequence, we either avoid commitment or become complacent.

When we are not sure how to come to know God’s will, Thomas Merton offers excellent, down-to-earth advice. In New Seeds of Contemplation, he writes:

The Senate Scandal: The Slippery Slope of Incoherence

By Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

Credit:www.westislandgazette.com

It all started with moments of self-entitlement. Lapses of judgment led to lies and cover ups. It all ended in the current predicament of the Canadian government, which has been consumed by the Senate expenses scandal. It is very easy to accuse the guilty parties, or simply to play partisan politics. I don’t intend to judge the senators, and those who are accused of assisting with cover-ups due to their lapse in judgement. Their actions are being examined by the Senate, and suspensions, sanctions and criminal charges, if any are laid, are being assessed.

Focus and Schedules: The Spirituality of Time Management

By Santiago Rodriguez, S.J.

Credit: www.domicileexperts.com

I am a busy person (read: I run around like a headless chicken, trying to get some work done). I often complain that I do not have enough time to accomplish all that needs to get done. For the longest time I have mismanaged my time … somewhat. I don't have a problem; I have “time” issues. Even though I often find myself rushing to places, double-booking myself, missing deadlines, I've never attempted to tackle my “issue” and solve this mismanagement of time. See, I am too perfect (read: lazy, cynical and full of denial) to have a problem.

The Case of the First Domino Tile

By Edmund Lo, S.J.

Photo: footage.shutterstock.com

Sports has an important place in the lives of children. Many begin to participate in some forms of it at a young age. For those who don't have a taste for it, they may nonetheless choose to follow some professional sports team for personal interest or familial reasons, i.e. Daddy likes this team, so I like this team too. Growing up as a sickly boy back in the 1990s, I had no choice but to fall into the latter group. I began to follow a British football club called Manchester United, and have remained a loyal fan ever since. This past Tuesday, Manchester United played against a Spanish football club which has just as much glamour and history, in a colossal match, which saw the opposing team manager claim that the world will stop to witness this clash of titans. As exciting as it sounded, this presented a problem for me.

Sherlock Holmes’ Attic Theory

By Artur Suski, S.J.

www.youtube.com

In the second episode of Elementary from the television network CBS, Sherlock Holmes has yet another heated discussion with Dr. Watson, this time regarding the mind; Sherlock laments that too much useless information clutters our minds. He names his “data filtering” system the attic theory. The attic is where useful things are stored; but when we begin to accumulate useless things there too, we will need to get rid of the useful things just to make space for the useless. In other words, the useless begins to displace the useful.