Fr. David Nazar, S.J. On The Church And The Ukraine

Ukrainian protestors

The struggle against corruption and for democracy in Ukraine has become the Church’s struggle for dignity, “The Church’s role is quite significant in this whole call for a truer justice through peaceful means,” said Fr. David Nazar in a Jan. 26 e-mail to The Register. Bishops, priests, nuns and lay brothers have been in the middle of protests in the main square of the Ukrainian capital. Ukrainians have been protesting against President Viktor Yanukovych since November, when the president shelved an agreement to deepen ties with the European Union and made clear his plans to forge tighter ties with Russia. The anti- government protests have been getting stronger and have recently been met with violence from Ukraine’s security forces. “The overall and enduring atmosphere on the square is peaceful non-violence,” reports Nazar. “There is no alcohol allowed. There is prayer every hour. There is no retaliation for the violence — and now five killings — by the special forces, except the stones to keep them at a distance. You really have to be impressed with the nature of this revolution.”

honesty and peace, says a Canadian Jesuit in Ukraine.

Nazar is a former provincial superior of the English Canadian Jesuits who has been in Ukraine over the last decade helping the order there set up schools and a novitiate program to accommodate a flood of young men seeking to become priests in the Catholic Church’s largest male religious order. Nazar has written for a Jesuit publication in Italy that the protesting Ukrainians have chosen Western, democratic and Christian ideals.

“The Ukrainian people are European, even if the government is not,” wrote Nazar. “It is these very values, whose roots are Christian and which the West takes for granted, that represent the longing of the people and the healing of the country.” Nazar’s report to The Register from Kiev’s Independence Square comes just as Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops’ president Paul-André Durocher has urged the prayers of all Canadian Catholics for peace and justice in Ukraine.

Link (here) to the Catholic Register of Canada

Many Jesuits....To This Day Speak Of Him Warily

Argentine Jesuits in an undated photo with Holy Father Francis at the lower left corner  (source)

In a 2005 profile of Cardinal Bergoglio, Jose Maria Poirier, editor of the Argentinean Catholic magazine Criterio, wrote, “He exercised his authority as Jesuit provincial with an iron fist, calmly demanding strict obedience and clamping down on critical voices. Many Jesuits complained that he considered himself the sole interpreter of St Ignatius of Loyola, and to this day speak of him warily.”

Link (here) to Fr. Z

He Raised The Baby From The Dead

Father Necktou was the Jesuit Provincial in the South West of France for many years. The priests who knew him regarded him as a Saint and Prophet. He prophesied the suppression of the Jesuit Order well before its occurrence in 1773. After the suppression occurred as he predicted, he lived as a secular priest in Poitiers. His public reputation for holiness during this period induced a young grieving mother whose baby had just died to bring it in hope to Father Necktou. It was attested by several witnesses that he raised the baby from the dead and returned it to its mother. He died in 1777 roughly 20 years before the French Revolution.

Link (here)

Jesuit Says We Are, "Clerically Asphyxiated"

Fr. Agbonkhianmeghe Orobator, S.J.

Problems of discrimination and exclusion are so manifest within the Catholic community today that the church “totters on the brink of compromising its self-identity as the basic sacrament of salvation,” a theologian told his peers here Friday. Speaking frankly to some 300 colleagues assembled for an annual meeting of the Catholic Theological Society of America (CTSA), Jesuit Fr. Agbonkhianmeghe Orobator said that of particular concern is the disregarded role of women in the church. Saying that women are often the “face of redemption turned visibly” toward those the church serves, but are often “banished beyond the borders of relevance,” Orobator said the state of their participation in the church community leads to an uncomfortable question. 

“As a church, so long as we surreptitiously but tenaciously rehearse the politics of discrimination and exclusion, we stand before God, as Cain was, befuddled by a question that we simply cannot wish away at the wave of a magisterial wand,” said Orobator. 

“And the question is: ‘Church, where is your sister? Church where is your mother?’” Orobator’s comments came in a plenary session Friday morning during the four-day CTSA convention. The 67th annual gathering of the group, the theme for this year’s event is “Sacrament/s and the Global Church.” Orobator is a native Nigerian who now teaches at the Jesuit School of Theology and Institute of Peace Studies in Nairobi, Kenya and also serves as the head of the Eastern Africa province of Jesuits, which encompasses Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. Titling his talk “A Global Sign of Outward Growth: the Sacramentality of the World Church in the Era of Globalization,” Orobator covered a wide-range of topics, focusing on the meaning of the sacraments and the church’s sacramentality in a global context. Orobator’s addressing of the role of women in the church came after the priest said that while the liturgical reforms passed during the Second Vatican Council prioritized “active participation and wide inclusivity” of lay people in the church, they are “in reality, however … used by some to warrant exclusion of women from sacramental ministry and leadership.” Following his remarks on the role of women, Orobator also questioned a number of other areas where, he said, the church doesn’t reflect its notion of sacramentality. 

“On the evidence of current events, this ‘socially constituted,’ hierarchically regimented, dogmatically policed, and clerically asphyxiated community called church increasingly signifies hurt and pain for some people of God on account of their vulnerability, 

silence and intimidation for others on account of their honest engagement in the venerable task of fides quarens intellectum, and exclusion and marginalization for many, very many, on account of their gender, race, or social location."

Link (here) to the National Catholic Fishwrap to read the piece on Fr. Agbonkhianmeghe Orobator, S.J.

The Prudent Man

Fr. John R. Connery, S.J.

PRUDENCE AND MORALITY by FR. JOHN R. CONNERY, SJ.

PRUDENCE to the modern mind suggests caution. The prudent man is the man who takes no risks. He is a conservative who will neither raise his head above the crowd nor stand out from it. If such prudence is associated with morality at all, it is with a kind of moral mediocrity. The prudent man never does anything very bad; neither does he do anything very good. Prudence of this stamp hinders rather than promotes perfection. If everybody practiced it, there would be no heroes because there would be no such thing as heroic virtue. In fact, a premium would be put on inactivity. 

The less a person did or said, the fewer mistakes he would make, and hence the more prudent he would be considered. To some the word may suggest something more positive, but at most it connotes nothing more than a kind of secular virtue. It is the virtue of the "children of this world." The prudent man is the worldly-wise man. He knows how to make his way around this world; he is the successful business man.

At its best, such prudence is indifferent to morality; at its worst, it is directly opposed to it. Moral t heologians themselves may have unwittingly cooperated in this secularization of the virtue of prudence. A glance through modern manuals of moral theology leaves the impression that it has little moral significance. If it is treated at all, it is dealt with only in passing, or at most as a kind of isolated virtue. 

Since the time of St. Alphonsus Ligouri moral theology has been built around the commandments rather than around the virtues, and while this is a more convenient approach in a subject of interest chiefly to confessors, it is concerned more with vice than with virtue. 

Justice and temperance, it is true, have survived this approach in moral text books, but prudence has lost the key position which it held in Scholastic moral treatises.

Link (here) to read the full article

"I Don't Go To Church No More,"

St. Ignatius Mission Church in St. Ignatius, Montana

"It took me 40 years to separate the Catholic religion and belief in God," said Garry "Bob" Salois, who despite his palpable anger took off his cap when he entered St. Ignatius church. "I believe there's got to be a creator of all things. But if Jesus Christ and his bunch are a true religion, he's forsaken me a long time ago." Leland "Jimi" Hewankorn has worked to reclaim his tribal heritage, turning to traditional ways. "I don't go to church no more," he said. "I confess to Him only. I don't confess to a human being."

The men said they're waiting for something more valuable than money. "I got over being angry," Burke said. "But I want an apology. Not for myself, but the whole Indian race." Salois hopes the Rev. Patrick Lee, the leader of the Oregon Province, comes to St. Ignatius to apologize in person - although at the thought, his anger flashed anew. "I'd tell him, I don't accept your apologies. It's too damn late," he said. 

But a moment later, he added, "I'd go and see what kind of apology he gives. If it's a real one, I'll accept it. But if it's one of their old phonies, I'll spit in his face and go away." And Hewankorn wants to ask the old, unanswerable question. "Why? Why did you do that to us?"

Link (here) to the full Missoulian article.

New British Jesuit Provencial, Fr. Dermot Preston, S.J.

Fr. Dermot Preston, S.J.

The Jesuits have named Fr Dermot Preston as their new Provincial for Britain. Fr Preston, who is currently regional superior in Guyana, will succeed current Provincial Fr Michael Holman, who has been appointed principal of Heythrop College in west London. Born in 1957, Fr Preston joined the Jesuits in 1979 and was ordained in 1990 after teaching chemistry and RE at St Aloysius’ College in Glasgow for his regency. He has worked in Guyana for five years and also in South Africa, where he was ecclesiastical assistant to the Christian Life Community. Before that he was vocations director for the British Province for a number of years. He is also a noted film buff who has written about the Catholic influence on Alfred Hitchcock’s filmmaking. Writing to the British Jesuits, Fr Holman said: “I know you will all want to join me in congratulating Dermot and in assuring him of your prayers and your support now and long after.” Fr Holman, who was headmaster of Wimbledon College in south London from 1995 to 2004, will take up his appointment at Heythrop after the end of his six-year term of office as Provincial in July.

Link (here) to the Catholic Herald for the full story.

Jesuit Father Thomas Lawler has been appointed to be the next provincial of the Wisconsin Province of the Society of Jesus. The appointment was made by Jesuit Superior General Father Adolfo Nicolás, and it will take effect in June 2011. Fr. Lawler will succeed Jesuit Father Thomas Krettek.

Link (here)

Former Jesuit Says, " Jesuits,... Have Lost Their Inspiration"

Jack de Groot

Former Jesuit Jack de Groot, head of Catholic aid agency Caritas, is slightly sceptical of this notion. The Jesuit spirituality is attractive - ''people are redeemed by God to do good things. It's a large vision with a bit of risk-taking and adventure, and intellectual rigour and robustness'' - but he thinks there is a myth and mystique about Jesuits, which they trade on and encourage. He says they struggle to collaborate and that they have lost inspiration as they lose control of their enterprises. Jesuit provincial Steve Curtin acknowledges there is some justice in de Groot's criticism. ''We are doing more now than we've ever done,'' he says. ''There's lay leadership in a lot of areas. It's an evolving partnership, but it's not easy for Jesuits to learn to work collaboratively. We've been trained to take the initiative and be out on the front line without a lot of support or help. Teamwork has not been our forte.''

Link (here) to the full article in The Age

Was?

Provincial Stephan Kiechle, S.J.

However, in his Suddeutsche Zeitung interview, Fr Kiechle said his order would only be in a position to offer “symbolic payments”, adding that he expected some victims would “inevitably be disappointed” with the compensation. “It remains small and fragmented, as a sign of our helplessness in the face of this suffering”, the Jesuit superior said. “But sometimes, the guilty parties are unreasonable, and sometimes they’ve disappeared, fallen ill or died. In these cases, we as an order must recognise our fault and take responsibility”. 

The priest, who took over as Jesuit leader on 1 September, called at a recent conference for the abolition of compulsory celibacy and for women to be considered for admission to the priesthood.

Link (here) to  Jonathan Luxmoore's blog

Fr. Abrose D'Mello, S.J. "Rest In Peace":

Jesuits in India have mourned the death of Father Ambrose D’Mello, a pioneering missioner. Father D’Mello, who was the first Jesuit Provincial of India, died of cancer on April 18 at Guwahati, Assam. He was 87. Mourning the death, Father Edward Mudavassery, current Jesuit provincial of South Asia, told UCA News on April 19 that his late confrere had braved great odds to start several missions in India. Father D’Mello took the initiative to set up the office of the Jesuit Provincial of India to coordinate the works of the Society of Jesus in the country. The office was later renamed the Jesuit Provincial of South Asia.

Read the rest of the article in its entirety (here)

Television Jesuit M.D.

M.D. and Priest at the Same Time? Jesuit Provincial to Appear on Live CatholicTV Talk Show

WATERTOWN, MA- On April 27^th, Fr. Myles Sheehan, S.J. will appear on the live CatholicTV talk show “This is the Day”. Fr. Sheehan is the Provincial of the New England Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits).

Before becoming Provincial in 2009, Fr. Sheehan practiced medicine and was also a professor of medicine at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois.

This is the Day airs at 10:30AM ET at CatholicTV.com and on CatholicTV. The show is rebroadcast at 7:30PM.

Father Sheehan is originally from Marshfield, Massachusetts. Prior to entering the Society of Jesus, he completed his undergraduate degree at Dartmouth College and doctorate in medicine at Dartmouth College.

Father Sheehan joined the New England Province on August 25, 1985 and made his novitiate at St. Andrew House in Boston, MA. After completing his philosophy studies at Loyola University in Chicago, he did two years of post-doctoral studies in Gerontology at Harvard Medical School. He earned his M.Div. from the Weston School of Theology in Cambridge and was ordained to the priesthood on June 18, 1994.

On April 22, 2005, he professed solemn vows. Since 1995, Myles has served as a Professor of Medicine at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. In 2000, he added the administrative duties of senior associate dean to his teaching and research responsibilities.

Father Sheehan was also recently featured on the CatholicTV show “Going My Way”. On the show, Fr. Sheehan played the guitar and was interviewed by Fr. Chris Hickey. This episode can be seen now at: http://www.catholictv.com/shows/default.aspx?seriesID=41&videoID=1069

Episodes of This is the Day are posted on the site’s archives starting the same night of the broadcast day. All videos at the website are viewable in full-screen. Paste this URL into your browser in order to access the “This is the Day” video archives. http://www.CatholicTV.com/shows/default.aspx?seriesID=72

CatholicTV broadcasts across the US on Sky Angel channel 142, and selected cable outlets in New England and in Chattanooga (TN) where CatholicTV is available on FiTV channel 153. To find out where to watch CatholicTV visit: http://www.CatholicTV.com/schedule/where-to-watch.aspx

CatholicTV is a nationally-broadcasted television network streaming a live feed 24 hours a day at CatholicTV.com.  Heeding Pope Benedict XVI's call to greater utilize the power of television and new media, the CatholicTV Network features its cable TV station, Catholic web site, mobile apps and widget.  Celebrate Mass online; pray The Rosary; enjoy programs on prayer, the saints, the Scriptures and the Catholic Church on America's Catholic Television Network.

“This is the Day” can also be seen on demand at www.CatholicTV.com or downloaded via iTunes.com.and SQPN.com  The hosts, Director of CatholicTV, Father Robert Reed, and General Manager, Jay Fadden  discuss various topics of the week and respond to viewer mail (you may email the show at thisistheday@CatholicTV.com)

Jesuit Provincial Was The Last Male Heir Of St. Thomas More

RELICS OF SAINT THOMAS MORE.

FATHER THOMAS MORE, S.J., the last English provincial of the old Society, was the last male heir of the martyr. He died in 1795, and through him the family heirlooms of various relics of his blessed ancestor came to Stonyhurst College. Father More had a sister, who was superioress of the English Canonesses of St. Augustine at Bruges, and he gave her the only relic of the body of the martyr that is known to exist—excepting, of course, the head. Half of the Bruges relic is now, by the kindness of a successor of Reverend Mother More, at Manresa, Roehampton. . The existence of this relic, descending in the family, speaks for the existence of a family tradition that the tomb of Saint Thomas had been opened some time after the martyrdom. A large collection of interesting relics of Saint Thomas is preserved by the Jesuit fathers in their college of Stonyhurst. The following description is from the Stonyhurst Magazine of February, 1887 :—

Link (here)

Photo is of St. Thomas More's hat (here)

Tyrannicide: Rösch, Delp And Wehrle

Fr Hermann Josef Wehrle had merely heard the confession of a German cavalry officer, Major Ludwig Freiherr (Baron) von Leonrod, who was not even part of the 20th July plot to overthrow Hitler. He had declined to get involved. Baron Leonrod was nevertheless condemned to death for not revealing what he knew about the July 20th plot, which was, in any case, very little. Fr Wehrle knew even less but Baron Leonrod came to him for spiritual counsel and confession.

Fr Wehrle gave him him open spiritual counsel and told him that tyrannicide was moral if the tyrant had no legal right to be leader.

Outspoken opposition to the Nazis by individual Jesuits resulted in harsh response from government officials, including imprisonment of priests in concentration camps. The government takeover of church property, "Klostersturm", resulted in the loss of valuable properties such as that of Stimmen der Zeit, teh Jesuti newspaper, and limited the work of the Jesuits in Germany. The Jesuit provincial, Rev Fr Augustin Rösch S.J., Father Afred Delp's superior in Munich, became active in the underground resistance to Hitler.

Link (here) to the blog entitled Roman Christendom and read the full story.

Photo of German Headquarter after the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler on July 20th, 1944

Fr. Paul Le Jeune, S.J.

Fr. Paul Le Jeune, S.J. was the first head of the Jesuit order in New France, this Black Robe deserves the number of the holy trinity: Born a Protestant, he was a convert to Roman Catholicism. He gave out Jesuit rings to aboriginal converts, rings which became the first ceremonial rings to be distributed in Quebec - long before Stanley Cup rings.

Link (here)

When a Jesuit Brakes The Vow Of Celebacy

The great taboo subject of the Catholic Church.

Commissioner Thiel, a "heathen child" emerges, a sacred into the world of denial and silence, learns about the plight of all those involved - from adultery and secret family ties is the issue: the plight of the priests who violate the celibacy of women concealed and children.

And there are more than you think, estimate concerned initiatives that exist in Germany from 3000 to 5000 concealed from God's children. But few party dare to break her silence.

• The Jesuit's wife: "The Jesuit Order prevented contact"

Wiltrud Weber has since 6 October before the institution of the Jesuit Order of St. Georgen in Frankfurt has started a hunger strike, wants to accept the "blatant injustice to children is no longer a priest." David Weber's father is now deceased Australian Jesuit (23 Feb 1968 to 15 Feb 1973) Provincial Francis Peter Kelly.

The order had prevented the contact between the father and his family, even then, when he was already eliminated from the Order, says the translator. Wiltrud Weber wants the Jesuits to make restitution: "The children of Catholic Priests, with consequences well into adulthood, a group suffer discrimination in our society. You have a fundamental human and civil rights as the contact with one's own Father, maintenance and inheritance withheld. This needs to change."

Link (here) to the original article in German you will have to use a translator.

A Jesuit Martyr Took With Honor A Name From A Jesuit Martyr

The impression that Father Edmund Campion made on the mind of Father William Weston may be best gathered from the name that he chose in the place of his own by which to be called when sent on the English mission.

Edmund Campion had then set the crown to his apostolic career by his happy martyrdom, and Father Weston, out of veneration for him, took the name of Edmonds,

by which he was better known in England than by his own. This was not the only instance of homage of this sort to Campion's name. In those times it was necessary for all who thought of coming on the English mission to conceal their identity as far as possible by change of name.

The love of Father Campion must have been strong to induce a priest to take a name that was so likely to draw attention to him, and bring him into trouble; yet this was what was done by the martyred priest, whom we honour under the name of Edward Campion.

His true name was Edwards, and he said on his examination, as Lord Keeper Puckering (here) notes against him, that "he wisheth he were no worse a traitor than Campion, that was executed for treason."

Link (here) to the full account in the book entitled, The Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, by Fr. John Morris, S.J.

Engraving is of the Tower of London.

Father Weston was a prisoner for the Faith for seventeen years, partly in the Clink prison and the Tower, London, partly at Wisbech Castle. Link (here)

New New England Provincial

The New England Province of the Society of Jesus announced that Father Myles N. Sheehan, S.J., became the 15th

provincial on the July 31, the feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits.

Father Adolfo Nicolas, S.J., Superior General of the Society of Jesus, appointed Father Sheehan Provincial of the New England Province on Feb. 19, to succeed Father Thomas J. Regan, S.J., whose six-year term had ended.

“I am honored to be chosen for this service to the Jesuits of New England and our lay colleagues. I am grateful to Father Regan for his work and service over the last six years and look forward to building on the sound foundation he has built,” said Father Sheehan.

Link (here)

Blogger Note: The New England Province faces a tough prospect of falling numbers of Jesuits in the province, recruiting vocations and staffing reductions are a big issues.

Fr. John D. Whitney, S.J. - A World Of Grace

The poet and Jesuit priest, Gerard Manley Hopkins, once wrote that “The world is charged with the grandeur of God.” I suppose, more than anything, that has been my experience and my greatest hope.

A quote by Fr. John Whitney, S.J.

Link (here) to the wonderful and pictorial world of Fr. John D. Whitney's personal website.

Doctor Provincial

Cardinal Francis George's personal physician plans to depart Chicago and leave medicine next month to take a job with his Roman Catholic religious order.

Fr. Myles Sheehan, 53, a Jesuit priest who has sported a clerical collar and white lab coat for 14 years at Loyola University Health System, has been selected to be the next provincial, or leader, of the Jesuits' New England Province based in Boston.
"As provincial, one of my main responsibilities will be taking care of the 300 Jesuits in New England, and I have a real peace knowing I will be able to ensure these men are taken care of," Sheehan said.

Link (here) to the full article