~ by Fr. Jack Bentz, SJ
For Jesuits, the Eucharist is at the center of their prayer and their life together. Most Jesuit communities have a space dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament for private prayer and all Jesuit communities gather together for regular Eucharistic celebrations. While the quality of this celebration can vary as widely as the character of the Jesuits participating, the Eucharist is where we have the opportunity to find God every time we allow ourselves to be found at Eucharist. For when we gather with each other in …

1. Where are you currently missioned and how’s it going?
My Provincial has missioned me to philosophy studies at St Louis University. Philosophy studies—or ‘first studies’—is the second stage of formation in the Jesuits following two years in the Novitiate. I am a student again. The majority of my time is spent reading books and writing papers. I do a lot of pondering. And while the focus of my mission is on my intellectual and spiritual formation, I am keenly aware that my education is not self-serving. Rather, I study in …

‘In 1595, when an upstart player named William Shakespeare was writing a fantastical comedy in English verse called “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” for the London stage, on the opposite side of the globe, in the southern Chinese city of Nanchang, an equally remarkable man named Matteo Ricci was composing an essay on friendship in the formal diction of classical Chinese. Ricci called his essay simply “You lun” (Essay on Friends), a title that would later be changed under the influence of one of Ricci’s many Chinese friends to the more …

~ excerpt from an essay by Enrique E. Fabbri, originally published in Argentine magazine Criterio.
‘A lot is written today about leadership, yet most of these works do not propose or indicate which are the qualities of a true leader. There is a lot of falseness and shallowness in this field. The fabric of many large companies lacks an effective and human guidance as well as personal and trustworthy one. They lack a more visionary leadership inspired in those men and women capable of teaching, conducting, training and assessing all kinds …

To love someone is to be in active relationship with them. St. Ignatius believed that this action consists in a mutual sharing of goods between the ones who love. Technical as it sounds, we all experience this, however imperfectly, in our many human relationships. And all this is true when it comes to our relationship with God, except that the love of God is perfect. But it is not enough to say that God is love and leave it at that. God is love, therefore God shares what God is …