Archive for the ‘Vocations’ Category

During the twelve years that Jesuits are in formation, they participate in a series of what are called “experiments.” These experiences were designed by the founder of the Society of Jesus, St. Ignatius of Loyola, to test if these men who are in formation, also known as “novices,” can do what Jesuits do and live as Jesuits live. One of these experiences is called the “long experiment,” and is a time when each Jesuit novice does five months of full-time apostolic work while living in a Jesuit community.

For his long experiment, Jesuit novice Tim Casey taught at Yap Catholic High School in Micronesia. In this shortened piece below, you can read about Casey’s experience. The full piece can be found on this page of the New York,  New England and Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus’ vocations website.

Before I entered the Jesuits, I had been a high school teacher. I worked in two affluent school districts in the metro-Boston area and I felt confident that I had become a good teacher. I knew that there were better teachers than I, but I was confident that I was good. And so when the novice director asked what I wanted to do for long experiment, teaching was not at the top of my list. In the novitiate, I had enjoyed branching out into other ministries. I had worked in the jails and prisons of New York State, I had helped administer an annotated version of the Spiritual Exercises and I had worked as a hospital orderly in the Bronx. I remember feeling lukewarm about returning to my former profession, and made my preferences known to the novice director about what would be best for long experiment.

The Jesuits have an old Latin expression, agere contra, which roughly translated means to go against the grain. By this, St. Ignatius of Loyola meant that if you feel a certain resistance to something in your life, then it might be beneficial for you to engage those feelings, trying to see what you are resisting and why you are resisting it. And so when my novice director asked me to teach during my long experiment, I said that I would be willing, but I was not particularly excited about the prospect. However, I did make one request of him: Could this teaching position be in some way unconventional and different from my former career? He honored my request. I was sent to a remote island in the North Western Pacific Ocean to teach in a newly established high school in Yap, Micronesia.

Yap is part of the Federated States of Micronesia, a place that has been called “The edge of the world,” by a Jesuit who spent most of his life here. It is one of four states that make up the FSM. I didn’t know much about Micronesia, except that the Jesuits ran a prestigious school on the island of Chuuk called Xavier High School. But that was not where I was headed. Where was this place?

The local church on Yap had been trying for a number of years to open a Catholic high school. In the summer of 2011, two New York Province Jesuits were sent to Yap to make good on the promise of Catholic education and opened Yap Catholic High School in August of that year. They had four teachers (including themselves), two borrowed classrooms, and 34 students. I would become the fifth teacher, teaching Science, Social Studies, moderating the robotics club, acting as an assistant basketball coach, and doing a variety of other odds and ends to aid them in getting this school off the ground and running.

It is an intriguing place, a place that seems to be unencumbered by the events that have transpired in the other parts of the globe. The expression, “An island onto itself” seems to be fitting in more ways than one.

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This month, 12 men from various walks of life and who entered the Society of Jesus over a decade ago were ordained as priests. Following ordination, these new priests will serve in parishes and teach in Jesuit universities, among other assignments.

Last year, we followed Jesuit Father Radmar Jao on his own journey to ordination. Now, Fr. Jao walks us through an ordination ceremony for three of his fellow Jesuits—Jesuit Fathers Christopher Duffy, Richard Magner and Trung Pham—which took place June 9 at the Chapel of the Sacred Heart on the campus of Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.

This short video gives a unique glimpse into an ordination Mass with Fr. Jao explaining the actual process of the ordination ceremony step-by-step.

Dan Kennedy graduated from Boston College (BC) last month, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and the recipient of the school’s most prestigious prize, the Edward H. Finnegan Award.

Winners of the Finnegan, given to the student who best exemplifies the BC motto, “ever to excel,’’ tend to go big – top grad schools, Wall Street, overseas fellowships. Kennedy is planning to give away his computer, recycle his Blackberry, and move to a modest communal house in St. Paul, Minn.

He will get $75 a month for incidentals. He will have no romantic relationships. He will go where his superiors ask him to go, and do what they ask him to do. If all goes well, Kennedy – “Dan-o’’ to his friends – can hope to be ordained a Jesuit priest in 2023.

Entering a religious order straight out of college is rare these days, particularly for a standout student at an elite school. One or two graduating BC seniors enter seminary each year, but never in recent memory has a Finnegan winner done so.

“Um, I could never see Dan-o on Wall Street,’’ Shannon Griesser, a junior, said, laughing. “I’ve never met such a kind human being, to the core.’’

But he is hardly a “laxbro,’’ either, as one of his theology professors, Stephen Pope, quipped. (The term is slang for a lacrosse-obsessed frat brother.)

Medium height and solidly built, the bespectacled Kennedy keeps his room in military order, his comforter neatly folded, paper clips and pens exactingly arrayed in his desk drawer. He uses words like “unitive,’’ as in, “There’s nothing more unitive than enjoying a meal together.’’ There is no self-consciousness in his voice when he talks about his motivation for becoming a Jesuit: “My personal relationship with Jesus Christ.’’

“It’s the love I feel from God, and how I want to reciprocate that,’’ he said.

“I’m not entering the church of 50 years ago or 500 years ago. I’m entering the church in 2012,’’ he said. “So you have to be realistic about the challenges of the images of priesthood in this day and age. . . . I don’t find it daunting, but it’s going to be a challenge.’’

Many of his closest BC friends are religious – but many are not. Florence Candel, an atheist who said she arrived at school with “a lot of anger at the church,’’ developed a strong friendship with Kennedy, who presented a face of Catholicism that Candel said she had never seen before – open, accepting, and embracing her questions as invitations for conversation. “Dan-o just basically taught me that to say I have a lack of faith is incorrect,’’ she said. “I obviously have faith in some things. Maybe not the same faith as people around me have, but that’s OK.’’

Candel still calls herself an atheist, but she sometimes participated in the informal “examens’’ Kennedy held for friends in his room on Monday nights. A cornerstone of Ignatian spirituality, the examination of consciousness is a ritual of prayerful reflection on daily life.

For 15 or 20 minutes, the group would sit together in Kennedy’s dorm room, a suite shared with three roommates, and silently consider questions Kennedy posed: “Where did you encounter God today? When could you have been more loving? What were you grateful for?’’

The daily examen is just one of the ways Kennedy continued to explore Jesuit life. In addition to attending Mass at least once a week, and getting to know the Jesuits on campus, he began to meet with a spiritual director, Jesuit Father William B. Neenan, BC’s vice president and special assistant to the president.

Kennedy will spend the first two years doing a series of “experiments’’ imitating the life of St. Ignatius, including a 30-day silent retreat, stints working at a hospital and with the poor. He will study a foreign language, and he will go on a pilgrimage with just $10 in his pocket and a letter from his superiors to speed his progress.

After the first two years, Kennedy will be sent to study philosophy for three years at a Jesuit university; then he will probably teach at one of the Jesuit high schools in the province. In the following three years, he will earn a master’s of divinity, preparing him for ordination.

Find out more about Kennedy’s considerations and expectations as he plans to join the Society of Jesus this August in this Boston Globe article.

“Go forth and set the world on fire.”

Spoken centuries ago by St. Ignatius Loyola to his brother Jesuits, these words—part mission statement, part marching orders—are deeply emblematic of the Society of Jesus and never more so than during the rite of ordination.

Twelve men burning with love of Christ and his mission were ordained as Jesuit priests this previous Saturday at ceremonies held at Fordham University in New York; Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, Calif.; Spring Hill College in Mobile, Ala.; and St. Thomas More Church in St. Paul, Minn.

A diverse group, the ordinands hail from Illinois, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, California, Louisiana, Florida, New York, Vietnam and Italy. Before entering the Society of Jesus, they worked in the financial and high-tech industries, served in the military, taught at the high school and college level, practiced medicine and earned a multitude of advanced degrees.

Their call to priestly ministry is as varied as their hometowns and former occupations, but they have one thing in common: a desire to dedicate themselves to the Jesuit mission of serving the Roman Catholic Church wherever the need may be greatest.

With each step of Jesuit formation—from the first years of novitiate, to philosophy studies, to regency, to theology studies—the ordinands have tended the flame of Christ’s love. Rigorously trained for priestly ministry in the Jesuit tradition, their spiritual lives have been steadily nurtured since the novitiate, their minds sharpened by years of academic study, their apostolic drives molded by service to others.

Jesuit priesthood is a gift from God for the service of the universal Church.

Christ has called.

These men have responded.

Ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam!

Fr. William V. Blazek, S.J., 47, hails from Chicago. After completing his Bachelor’s Degree at Marquette University, Father Blazek served five years in the 101st Airborne Division as an Infantry Officer. A graduate of the U.S. Army Ranger School, Father Blazek was awarded a Combat Infantryman’s Badge and a Bronze Star for his wartime service in Saudi Arabia and Iraq during Operations Desert Storm/Desert Shield. After the service, Father Blazek earned his Doctor of Medicine Degree from Rush Medical College, entering the Society of Jesus immediately following residency. After completing a Master’s Degree in health care ethics at Loyola University Chicago, Father Blazek was assigned to Georgetown University as an assistant professor of medicine. He served as an advisor to the Secretary of Defense on the Defense Health Board, a federal advisory panel addressing matters pertaining to the military health system. In 2009, Father Blazek was missioned to the Boston College School of Theology and Ministry to complete his final preparations and studies for ordination to the priesthood. Following ordination, he will be missioned to Gesu Parish in University Heights, Ohio, where he looks forward to providing sacramental ministry to the people of God, while sharing the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. (Chicago-Detroit Province)

Fr. Cesare Campagnoli, S.J., 47, was born in Voghera and raised in Casteggio, a town in Northern Italy just south of Milan. At the University of Pavia School of Medicine in Pavia, Italy, Father Campagnoli earned his Medical Degree in 1989 and then moved to Philadelphia for a fellowship in ultrasound prenatal diagnosis. His next course of study took Father Campagnoli to London, where he earned his Doctorate in obstetrics, gynecology and pediatrics from Imperial College School of Medicine. When his studies concluded, Father Campagnoli returned once again to Philadelphia to conduct clinical fetal stem cell research at Children’s Hospital. Troubled by the ethical issues surrounding his research, Father Campagnoli began considering a vocation and reading more about Ignatian Spirituality, entering the Society of Jesus in 2003. Interested now in studying bioethics, he earned a Master’s Degree in healthcare ethics from Loyola University Chicago and then completed a one-year fellowship in medical ethics at the University of Chicago. He returned to Italy in 2008 to earn a Baccalaureate Degree in sacred theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and is currently working towards a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from Boston College School of Theology and Ministry. Following ordination, Father Campagnoli will be assigned to St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, where he will teach a master’s course in healthcare ethics. (Maryland Province)

Fr. Christopher J. Duffy, S.J., 49, grew up near Rochester, N.Y., where he enjoyed learning, reading, music and playing sports. Father Duffy earned a Bachelor’s Degree in electrical and computer engineering from Clarkson University in Potsdam, N.Y., and promptly entered the high-tech industry after graduation. He held a variety of positions within the semiconductor and software industries, gaining experience in sales, marketing, operations, government relations and strategy before earning a Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Union College in Schenectady, N.Y. His Jesuit novitiate brought opportunities in teaching and hospital chaplaincy, while regency provided an opportunity to teach—at Loyola High School in Los Angeles—as both a physics instructor and assistant coach for the freshman basketball team. While completing his philosophy studies, Father Duffy participated in a process recommended by St. Ignatius: to serve at both ends of a spectrum. In this case, he taught business strategy to college students and the sacraments of Eucharist and Reconciliation to third graders. During the first two years of his time in theology, Father Duffy was a spiritual director, a 19th Annotation director and an eight-day retreat director. After ordination, he will serve at Our Lady of Sorrows Parish in Santa Barbara, Calif. (California Province) Read the rest of this entry »

Jesuit Father Radmar Jao’s path to ordination will begin airing today on CatholicTV’s program “The Call”. Fr. Jao was ordained a priest in the Society of Jesus last year and the months leading up to his ordination were documented in a series of video diaries published via YouTube as “Path to Priesthood”. CatholicTV is now rebroadcasting these video segments as a shortened, complete program to their audience.

Fr. Jao, formerly an actor, joined the Society of Jesus in 2001. Today, he serves as a vocation promoter for the California Province of the Society of Jesus. The “Path to Priesthood” series was shot when Fr. Jao was completing his last year of theological studies at the Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara University at Berkeley in California. The series captured the ups and downs of Fr. Jao’s journey and CatholicTV viewers will have an opportunity to follow along as well as see the ordination ceremony in Spokane, Wash.

The program will also be available at CatholicTV’s website and through their “on demand” channel. Fr. Jao will also appear on CatholicTV’s live show, “This is the Day”, on Tuesday, June 26 at 10:30 a.m. His interview will be available to view via CatholicTV’s YouTube channel after it airs live.

Below are the Eastern Daylight Standard airtimes for “The Call: The Jesuits – Path to Priesthood”. Check your local listings for more information:
The Call: The Jesuits – Path to Priesthood
Monday, 6/4 – 11:30am (premiere)
Wednesday, 6/6 – 6:00 a.m.
Friday, 6/8 – 9:00 a.m.
Sunday, 6/10 – 11:30 p.m.