Gospel light on banking crisis

Fr Tony O’Riordan SJ, Director of the Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice, has been speaking out on the recent banking crisis in Ireland and abroad, and on the Irish Government’s response. There has been no shortage of opinions from economic and financial experts, but few if any have focussed on the moral implications or on what light the Gospel can shed on these unprecedented events. According to Tony O’Riordan SJ, the government acted in good faith, but its decisive response to the crisis facing the banking sector is remarkably different in quality and conviction to its response to the crisis in health and housing endured by the less well-off. Read more »

Short Notices

• Fr Brendan Comerford SJ (photo right) will give his popular 4-week Scripture course, an introduction to the Gospels (taking one Gospel each night), from 7.30 to 9.30 on Tuesday evenings from 14 October to 4 November inclusive: in the Fr John Sullivan Room, Gardiner St Church; in conjunction with Iona Rd Parish. No booking required – come along on the first evening. Donation for course: €20.
• Seamus Murphy SJ had a terse and punchy letter in the Irish Times, 30 September, refuting the accusation that the Catholic Church has always been hostile to science.
• Transition Year students (15/16 years old) from Clongowes Wood College will be providing TEFL tuition (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) to interested residents of Eyre Powell Hotel, a Reception Centre for asylum seekers in Newbridge, Co. Kildare. This follows on from a successful pilot-programme last year.

Short notices

• Gerry Clarke SJ will celebrate his last Gardiner St Mass at 7.30pm on 28 September, as he is moving to the Democratic Republic of Congo on 17 October. Slí Eile are having a farewell gathering for Gerry afterwards – light refreshments from 8.30pm in The Belvedere Hotel Great Denmark St.
• Fr Ciary Quirke SJ will lead six reflective evenings to help those recovering from alcohol addiction to hand over their lives to God: in Manresa Jesuit Centre of Sprituality: 7.30 to 9.30 p.m. on successive Wednesdays from 24 September to 29 October inclusive.
• The construction of the new Cherryfield building is advancing swiftly. The move is expected to take place on 20 October.
• Readers may have noticed a distinctive Jesuit pen in recent weeks: Brendan Staunton of Gardiner Street contributed a long letter to The Tablet (20 September); a substantial review in the Irish Theological Quarterly, and a piece in The Pioneer on Mother Mary Aikenhead.
• St Declan’s School, Northumberland Road, Dublin 4, will commemorate fifty years of providing special education at a Jubilee Mass on Saturday 27 September at 12.00am in St Mary’s Church, Haddington Road, Dublin 4. Fr John Dardis SJ, Irish jesuit Provincial, will say the Mass.

Zambia’s lost leader

As the Zambian Jesuits mourn their dead president, their grief and sense of loss goes far beyond the conventional. Though Patrick Levy Mwanawasa was the third Zambian President, he was the first to die. A lawyer by profession, he kept the country united. Nobody was exempt from the law. He won praise for keeping the lid on once-rampant inflation and public spending. He had made a change in the presidency because of his upholding of honesty and his constant fight against corruption. Follow the ‘read more’ link to read the report of Jerry O’Connell SJ, who has spent most of his Jesuit life in Zambia.

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Bart rides the tide

Fifty years ago Fr Bart Kiely SJ, now professor of psychology at the Gregorian University, won the Lee swim as a 16-year-old. It is a different race now, 1700 metres downstream through the middle of Cork, helped by a turning tide. This year Bart set his sights on breaking 60 minutes. Scorning a wet suit (that would have put him into a different, sissy category) and braving hypothermia, he has just repeated the swim, and front-crawled the distance in 55 minutes, twenty minutes better than in 2007. Beside the water he bumped into a rival swimmer from his youth, Mary Wylie, now a grandmother. She was the fastest girl in Munster when Bart was the fastest boy. Bart would not confirm that he is organising a swimming race down the Tiber for the Prefects of Vatican Congregations.

Quiet revolution

The hallowed offices of the Sacred Heart Messenger, 37 Lr Leeson Street, have seen a quiet revolution in the last two months. Readers will have admired the new design which John Looby introduced last January. Since then Ken Rue has taken over as Accounts Manager, and Triona McKee as General and Marketing Manager. Both come with considerable experience in the publications field. Accountant Ken, in addition to his two-days-a-week job in the Messenger, is preparing for ordination in the Church of Ireland. Strabane-born Triona has worked on consumer magazines in London, and had a stint on the production side of Phoenix magazine. It is striking how quickly their benign impact has been felt in Number 37.

Moodling

Moodle, as every schoolboy knows, stands for Modular Organic Online Dynamic Learning Environment. To moodle also means to meander, wander about aimlessly. But there was nothing aimless about the day spent by the Provincial and some twenty of his more boffiny brethren and sisters in Belvedere on 18th July. A large Brummie (native of Birmingham) called Luke Sweeney, with the voice of a sergeant major and an inexplicable attachment to a soccer team called Aston Villa, led them with enormous energy through the intricacies of Moodle. He was a good teacher, and the whole operation was interactive, with everyone working at their own computers, but in immediate touch with everyone else through Moodle. What remains is to extend that level of communication to larger groups in and beyond the Province.

Discernment in community course

The Secretariat of Ignatian Spirituality (CIS) will hold a workshop on Communal Apostolic Discernment in the light of GC35, in Rome from January 19 to February 3, 2009. The course objectives are to develop the skills necessary to implement the Congregation’s recommendations concerning communal apostolic discernment and to apply this form of discernment to apostolic needs. The course is aimed at those involved in Ignatian group work, including Jesuits, lay collaborators, religious, and priests. For further information: Secretariat for Ignatian Spirituality, Borgo S. Spirito 4, C.P. 6139, 00195 Roma-Prati (Italia). Email: cisdir@sjcuria.org. Website: ciscourse.

New principal for Crescent

Dermot Cowhey is stepping down after five years as headmaster of the Crescent Comprehensive, Limerick. Nicholas Cuddihy, current principal of St. Dominic’s College in Dublin, has been appointed to take over at the beginning of the new academic year. Mr. Cuddihy from Dublin, has a degree in Theology and a masters in Educational Management and Leadership. Mr. Cowhey welcomed the new apointee speaking to the Limerick Leader: “We welcome the appointment, we are very pleased with it and the Board of Management are very confident in their decision.” [Photo: Dermot Cowhey]

Milltown holds double book launch

The Department of Spirituality at Milltown Institute is launching two books on May 30 at 5pm in the Institute Theatre. The first book is entitled With Wisdom Seeking God: The Academic Study of Spirituality. It is edited by Una Agnew, Bernadette Flanagan and Greg Heylin, and will be launched by Dr. Caroline Renehan, of Mater Dei and DCU. Jesuit contributors to this volume are Michael O’Sullivan, Seamus Murphy, David Coghlan, and Dominique Salin (Centre Sevres, Paris). The second book is entitled Audacity of Spirit: The Meaning and Shaping of Spirituality Today, by Jack Finnegan. It will be launched by Rev. Professor John Swinton, Professor in Practical Theology and Pastoral Care, School of Divinity, History and Philosophy, King’s College, University of Aberdeen.

Cut-price retreats for young adults (18-30)

For the second consecutive year, Saint Beuno’s Spirituality Centre in North Wales is offering retreats for young adults for as little as Stg£25. The Director of St Beuno’s, David Birchall SJ, notes that typical retreats costing Stg£300 to Stg£400 are too expensive, particularly for those in the 18-30 age group. So for an eight-day retreat beginning on Friday, June 6, and a six-day retreat from Thursday, 26 June, St Beuno’s is offering an individually guided retreat from just £25 deposit. Read more »

Young adult spirituality

Rory Halpin, the outgoing director of Slí Eile, has welcomed the Young Adult edition of Review of Ignatian Spirituality (no. 117). Entitled At the Service of Young Adults, the issue highlights the young adult world and the challenges inherent in today’s culture. Rory noted that the four ‘pillars’ mentioned by Edward Mercieca SJ in the introduction were what Slí Eile’s programs are trying to achieve: contact with the poor, contact with Christ, Church as community (faith sharing), and the experience of spiritual direction. Other articles are on accompanying young adults, the affective dimension of discernment, Life Choices and vocation.

Training Galway’s new spiritual directors

Eileen Houlihan from Milltown Institute visited the Diploma in Spiritual Direction course running in Galway last weekend 12-13 April. In her capacity as external examiner, she met the Manresa organising team of Angela Higgins IBVM, John Humphreys SJ and Brendan Comerford SJ. She also met the 13 canditates, taking time to examine their verbatims, reflections and book reviews. The two-year Spiritual Direction Diploma has another intake in September 2008. Also called spiritual mentoring or spiritual accompaniment, it is understood as the ministry of guiding others in their faith lives.