13 Mar

The need of each one to be an evangelizer is a high priority today. At the end of January 2015, The Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization hosted a 3-day meeting in Rome with delegates from across Europe to identify new and effective ways of passing on the faith. The press release from the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales about the meeting noted "There is not a single day when Pope Francis doesn't call us to go out to share our faith...

12 Mar

The Gospel for the Fourth Sunday of Lent includes a verse that is arguably one of the most quoted lines from scripture: "For God so loved the world that he gave up his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life." Reminders of John 3:16 appear at hockey games, football games, ads on buses and on billboards. Usually it is just presented as the phrase John 3:16. It shows up in some inconspicuous places. A popular fast-food chain in the USA prints it on the bottom rim of their paper cups. A popular clothing chain prints it on the bottom of their shopping bags....

09 Mar

Winter 2015 across Canada has been - you might say - an interesting one. In her poem today, Joan Levy Earle tells us what March will bring to Eastern Ontario....

08 Mar

On the morning of Sunday, 14 December 1997, I was looking forward to a relaxing day off, first by cleaning my room. I was busy with the vacuum cleaner when a community member burst into the room. Bishop Anthony just phoned. Tom has been killed!" I turned the machine off, put on a jacket, raced to the cycle shed, and after five minutes was at Tom's rented bungalow, a simple four room house. Rachan, the house boy, had come to work at 8:00 A.M. as usual. He found the front door ajar, and Tom lying on his floor sleeping matt, his throat slit. "...

06 Mar

During Lent, we often look for things we can give up. Extra snacks, sweets, and other food pleasures are popular as small sacrifices. If we make this effort without examining our soul's needs we might miss the greatest of opportunities that comes from the Lenten season....

05 Mar

I'm the first to confess that I am not very disciplined about taking a Sabbath day each week. I doubt that there are many of us who are so disciplined. If anything, Sunday is a day for me to catch up with projects that I hoped to get to earlier in the week. Or, scary thought, a day to do shopping errands that need attention! Most people have to acknowledge the reality that life can get full and the Sabbath – Sunday, Friday, or any other day – is a day to catch up. But is that what we really want? Couldn't we just spend the day with family and friends – inserting ourselves more fully into parish life, having a leisurely cappuccino and Danish, going for a leisurely walk, browsing a bookstore (yes, they still exist) or reading a good book!...

04 Mar

For more than 400 years, Jesuits working in Canada have written about their daily life and mission. Originally, their letters were published as The Jesuit Relations (Relations des jésuites). This blog, igNation, continues that tradition with a new series entitled: Getting to Know the Relations.Using excerpts chosen from the first 200 hundred years of these documents, the series presents vignettes which speak to the timeless heart of Jesuit endeavour: the promotion of discernment in order to help people find God in all things.Today: Something between a hovel and a palace...

03 Mar

You have probably never heard of me. I mean, that's okay; I'm fine with it. Really, I am. After all, my fifteen minutes of televised fame came early in life.Now, it wasn't exactly fifteen minutes, precisely; it was 30 seconds. And it was a 30-second commercial, of which I was only visible for about five. Yet, to my eight year-old self, five seconds of fame felt like forever. The commercial was a promo for one of Cleveland's local television channels. You know, the ones where they go we know OUR city," and then have a montage of B-reel shots of Cleveland's two famous landmarks before cutting to footage of the evening news team walking in and crossing their arms as they turn and face the camera, like a group of well-heeled superheroes." The article was first published on The Jesuit Post (thejesuitpost.org) on February 1, 2015....

02 Mar

For this week's poetry Tuesday, Greg Kennedy, SJ offers us some thoughts on the incidents in Paris....

01 Mar

If there is one phrase that sums up the spirituality of Ignatius of Loyola, it is "finding God in all things." A helpful image from the Saint's own story is his lifelong tendency to gaze up at the stars at night. One can guess that he pondered the words of Psalm 8 as he looked up at the heavens: "What are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?"In a desire to find God in everything, many Jesuits over the centuries have been committed to scientific pursuits....

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