Posts Tagged ‘Podcast’

The Jesuits of the New England and New York Provinces are offering a weekly Lenten podcast series, and in the second episode, Jesuit Father Steve Sanford talks about experiencing and overcoming darkness in one’s life through God.

“Sometimes in our life, God uses the experience of darkness to speak to us,” Fr. Sanford says.

Fr. Sanford shares a time of darkness from his own life, when he was assigned to go to Jamaica in 1988 for two years. “I was getting more and more anxious as the time drew close,” he recalls. “I was having trouble sleeping. I kept thinking, ‘I’m going to a country where I know nobody.’”

Fr. Sanford says talking to his friends and spiritual director didn’t help, but about two weeks before he was scheduled to leave, he was praying and asked God to help him.

“I heard a voice say to me: ‘Steve, don’t worry, no matter where you go, I will send you people to love.’”

Fr. Sanford says after he heard that in prayer, he relaxed and his fears about serving in Jamaica vanished.

“In that deep darkness of my life, that time of anxieties and fears, God spoke to me,” he says. “It’s a promise he made in 1988 and he keeps making each day.”

As he goes through this Lenten season, Fr. Sanford says he reminds himself that God is always going to send him people to love.

Listen to Fr. Sanford’s podcast at the New England Province website.

Last month, a video detailing atrocities committed by Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), which he heads, caused an Internet sensation. The video, which has been viewed by some 100 million people, made Joseph Kony a household name.

The warlord and his ruthless guerrilla group are responsible for a 26-year campaign of terror in Uganda that has been marked by child abductions and widespread killings. Last year, President Obama dispatched 100 U.S. troops — mostly Army Special Forces — to Central Africa to advise regional forces in their hunt for Kony.

The group running the Kony 2012 campaign is holding a nationwide event today – Friday, April 20 —  titled “Cover the Night,” where supporters are encouraged to spread the word of Kony 2012 around their local communities.

The Society of Jesus, the largest religious order of Roman Catholic priests and brothers in the world, has worked in Uganda for more than 40 years.  The Society’s Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) has conducted peace-building workshops, run schools and economic development projects and ministered to refugees in Uganda. In 2005, the Jesuits of the Eastern Africa Province began planning for a secondary school in northern Uganda, the Ocer Campion Jesuit College in Gulu. The co-educational high school admitted its first students in early 2010 and is already having a tremendously positive impact in a region devastated by over 20 years of civil war. The school will grow to a capacity of 1,200 students and includes agricultural and vocational training as well as rigorous academic formation in the Jesuit tradition, religious formation and peace education.

In this podcast, Jesuit Father Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, the Jesuit provincial of Eastern Africa, speaks with National Jesuit News about the Jesuit’s work in Uganda, the progress that’s been made, the work that still needs to be done and how young people can get involved.

During the liturgical season of Lent, many Catholics give things up – from avoiding Facebook to abstaining from the office candy jar – for 40 days. The list is endless. But Lent isn’t just about giving up; it can also be used as an opportunity for growth in your spiritual life.

Jesuit Father Gregory Konz, Secretary for Higher Education, Finance and Advancement at the Jesuit Conference, recently offered reflections on the four weeks (or periods of time) in St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises, and how each week can enhance our spiritual experience of Lent. Fr. Konz first made the Spiritual Exercises during two of the stages of his Jesuit formation: novitiate when a man first enters the Jesuits, and then years later after his ordination to the priesthood, during tertianship, the final stage of formation for a Jesuit.

In this month’s National Jesuit News podcast, we spoke to Jesuit Father Sean Carroll, who currently serves as the executive director of the Kino Border Initiative in Nogales, Ariz. along the border with Mexico.

The Kino Border Initiative (KBI) was founded in January 2009 as a binational effort to help support and provide assistance to deported migrants. Since its founding, KBI has served thousands of migrants by providing food, shelter, first aid and pastoral support.

Fr. Carroll recently spoke with National Jesuit News by phone from Nogales to discuss the work of KBI and about his own background as a Jesuit. You can listen to our podcast with Carroll via the player below.