Twice a year the Portland Novitiate of St. Francis Xavier hosts men who are interested in learning more about the Jesuits – and sharing a little bit about who they are and where they find themselves in the process of vocational discernment.
This weekend – and indeed every Palm Sunday weekend – a dozen or so guys move into the novitiate for a weekend of discovery and conversation.
Friday afternoon guys arrive by planes, trains and automobiles and the weekend starts off with a casual welcoming meal. Saturday is usually split up …

Jesuit playwright Bill Cain (New York Province Society of Jesus) has been having a big theatrical year. His play, Equivocation, premiered at Oregon Shakespeare Festival in March to an enthusiastic reception that continued through the entire season playing to capacity crowds. One festival patron saw it 21 times over the months it ran before the entire production with cast and director moved to Seattle Repertory Theater to another set of sold out crowds.
At almost the same time another production opened at Los Angeles’ Geffen Playhouse with a …

On November 3rd, the Jesuit novices of the Oregon and California Provinces entered the month long Spiritual Exercises which is the heart of the novitiate experience. These twelve men will be moving through the four weeks of meditations, prayer, and contemplations of their lives and the life of Christ, opening them to the life changing grace of God. The retreat comes to a close on the feast of St. Francis Xavier, December 3rd.
The Spiritual Exercises are pretty straight forward and profound at the same time. They are a way for …

~ a new production from Grassroots Films
Most of us have now seen Fishers of Men and God in the Streets of New York – but there’s a new production from Grassroots Films that offers an intense and dramatic look at what it means to be human and what exactly human life is all about.
The Human Experience is a vivid and beautifully shot film that takes audiences around the world and tries to connect with some of the suffering and hopes of our current age. Its creators promise a head-on …

A new edition of the Roman Missal is expected to be promulgated in the coming year. The USCCB site reports the following:
The texts of the revised translation of the Roman Missal are marked by a heightened style of English speech and a grammatical structure that closely follows the Latin text. In addition, many biblical and poetic images, such as “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof…” (Communion Rite) and “…from the rising of the sun to its setting” (Eucharistic Prayer III) have been …