Archive for the ‘Media’ Category

Yesterday marked the 50^th anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council, and Jesuit Father John W. O’Malley, a historian, theologian and professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., gave his thoughts on the legacy of Vatican II in both an interview with the Vatican Insider and an op-ed piece in The New York Times.

Fr. O’Malley says that one of the council’s legacies is that it gave the church “a new role as reconciler in a world torn apart by hatred and threats of violence.”

Reconciliation was one of the great themes running through the council, according to Fr. O’Malley. “The document of the liturgy, for instance, promoted a reconciliation of the church with non-Western cultures by inviting symbols and rituals from those cultures into the liturgy itself. The church thus distanced itself from the Western ‘cultural imperialism’ that affected even Catholic missionaries,” he says.

“Related to that reconciliation but perhaps even more pertinent for today’s world, was the reconciliation with Jews and Muslims, as expressed in the document Nostra Aetate. This meant putting behind us a tradition of belittling and denigrating those faiths, a tradition that had contributed to the horror of the Holocaust,” says Fr. O’Malley. “Pope John Paul II set a marvelous example by his many meetings with Jewish groups, as it is well known. Less well known, but in today’s tense international situation even more important, were his many meetings with Muslims.”

Fr. O’Malley says that Vatican II has already passed from experience and memory to history. Future generations, he says, “will experience what the council did not as a change but as ‘the way things are’ and maybe assume that is the way things have always been.”

In his op-ed piece, Fr. O’Malley concludes: “The post-Vatican II church was not a different church. But if you take the long view, it seems to me incontestable that the turn was big, even if failures in implementation have made it less big in certain areas than the council intended.”

Read the full interview with Fr. O’Malley at the Vatican Insider website and read his op-ed at The New York Times website.

“This is the story of a remarkable odd couple.” That’s the description of the new film “G-DOG” about Jesuit Father Greg Boyle and the former gang members, or homies, he’s served and befriended since 1992, when he founded Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles.

Homeboy Industries helps former gang members learn skills to better their lives and provides jobs in its bakery, café and t-shirt store.

“G-DOG” was directed by Academy Award-winning documentarian Freida Mock and had its U.S. debut this past June at the Los Angeles Film Festival.

Mock says she was inspired to make the film after seeing Fr. Boyle’s book “Tattoos on the Heart.” She remembers thinking, “A priest, kids, gangs and love? What’s this all about?”

The film, which is slated for theatrical release next year, introduces audiences to Fr. Boyle and the homies he helps. It also depicts a tough year for Homeboy Industries, with the possibility that the businesses will have to close because of challenging economic times.

Variety’s review said, “In an era with a paucity of real heroes, a genuine one emerges in “G-Dog”: the inexhaustible Jesuit priest Greg Boyle, whose Homeboy Industries has saved countless lives in Los Angeles’ gang-plagued neighborhoods.”

For more, visit the film’s website, www.gdogthemovie.com, where you can meet the cast and view clips.

For more than seventy years, the Jesuits of the New York Province have served the people of Micronesia.  And thanks to a new video series, their incredible, faith-filled ministry throughout the Pacific islands is being shared.

In the first episode, on faith and spirituality in action, three New York Province Jesuits explain what they love about serving in the Pacific.

Jesuit Father John Mulreany does pastoral ministry and teaches at Yap Catholic High School, which opened last year. He’s happy with how the Catholic community pulled together to support the new school.

“People are really passionate about deepening their faith … and having more opportunities for prayer and worship,” Fr. Mulreany says.

Jesuit Father Richard McAuliff is director of Xavier High in Chuuk. He says that one of the best aspects of serving there for the past 20 years is that everything is about relationships.

“We might not have the technology, we might not have the modern conveniences, but what I’ve been taught by the people out here is that the most important thing is relationships — whether it’s with God, each other or yourself,” says Fr. McAuliff.

Jesuit Father Marc Roselli, who also serves at Xavier High, says it’s been one of his most gratifying teaching experiences because the students are filled with life, receptive and faith-filled.

Watch the first episode below and visit the New York Province website to view the other episodes in the series.

Jesuit Father Paul Lickteig, who was ordained to the priesthood this past June, has written about his vocation for the Huffington Post. Fr. Lickteig, who also contributes to The Jesuit Post, explains how his vocation emerged in a piece titled “How I Became A Jesuit Priest.”

Fr. Lickteig writes that vocation is a strange thing:

“It is the idea that people can be drawn towards a particular way of life. Vocation is partially about the job, but more about the way a person’s choice of work allows something deeper to develop in his or her heart. For many, ‘the call’ comes at the expense of other aspirations. It is a trade-off. We let go of certain impulses and choose to follow other desires, in an oftentimes circuitous route, that we hope will lead towards a deeper awareness of how we might better love and serve humanity.”

For Fr. Lickteig, his desire to love and serve led him to “explore a single mystery in a deeper way: GOD.” When he found the Society of Jesus, he writes, “I found a group of people that were responding to this same mystery in a profound way.”

In the piece, Fr. Lickteig describes the wide variety of work he did during his eleven years of Jesuit training, which included working with addicts in the Bronx, gutting houses in New Orleans, taking classes in counseling, teaching religion at a prep school and building affordable housing in Omaha.

“I moved from community to community, never staying in one place for more than nine months at a time. In each new home I was asked to interact with the best and worst that humanity has to offer, and somehow find the grace of God thread through it all,” Fr. Lickteig writes. “Ultimately, this is the purpose of Jesuit training: to find Christ in all things.”

Fr. Lickteig concludes, “Eleven years ago I gave a commitment to continue exploring this great mystery in a faith that stretches back thousands of years. It is a yes I will continue to follow as this life unfolds mercifully before me.”

Read Fr. Lickteig’s full article at the Huffington Post.

Jesuit Father Robert Spitzer, former president of Gonzaga University, is “utterly convinced that the evidence from physics shows the existence of God.”

He backs up his statement with his new film, “Cosmic Origins,” a 49-minute documentary that features eight physicists who discuss the big bang theory, theories of modern physics and the need for a creator.

Along with Fr. Spitzer, founder of the Magis Center for Faith and Reason, the film features Michael Heller of the Vatican Observatory, Nobel Laureate Arno Penzias and professors from Harvard and Cambridge.

In choosing the physicists for the film, Fr. Spitzer made sure that  every scientist was “absolutely top in their field, world class, they had to be a Nobel prize winner, a Templeton prize winner or come from Harvard or Cambridge or from the top ranks of NASA.”

The scientists affirm that it is impossible for the universe to be random and without purpose, he said.

“When the universe was nothing, it could not have moved itself from nothing, something else had to do it, and that something else was a transcendent creator,” Fr. Spitzer said.

Fr. Spitzer claims that this creator would have to exist outside space and time because before the Big Bang, nothing existed, including space and time.

“Cosmic Origins” is available on Amazon, and information on a parish screening program is available through the “Cosmic Origins” website, www.cosmicoriginsfilm.com. Read more on Fr. Spitzer and his new film at Catholic News Agency.