The colors in these photos are a digital adaptation of the true colors but I like their view of what I saw this morning!
October 14, 2015
From me, the
new guy at the Jesuit Center:
Dear
Friends,
This
autumn of 2015 is the second time in my life that I have been the “new kid on
the block” here at what is now the Jesuit Center. My first years as a Jesuit were spent here at
what was then our Jesuit Novitiate. I
remember especially the winters when we novices had plenty of snow to
shovel. This year I look forward to
the winter since I am happily free at my age of that duty!
God
has been constant in so many ways but just as I have changed over fifty years,
so, too, this treasured Jesuit site in Wernersville is marked most clearly by a
change from Novitiate to a Center for Spiritual Growth for men and women of all
ages and callings, a facility for retreats and spiritual programming of varying
types, no one size fits all.
The
elements of the Jesuit retreat experience known as the Spiritual Exercises of
Saint Ignatius are essential to every Jesuit enterprise. In Jesuit schools throughout the world we
seek for our students the grace of self-knowledge, especially the knowledge of
God’s personal love, and the grace of self-reflection as one called to respond
to this love. In that way at least my
last thirty years of service in schools, a time long enough to have been amazed
to watch pre-K toddlers mature even to Ignatian educators, prepares me for
service at the Jesuit Center.
The
Jesuit Center continues to enrich the growth and mature commitments of
thousands each year. The health and
vigor of our staff and resources allow us to plan for Ignatian retreat
ministries far into the future. Even
now, for example, we already have retreats and programming in the planning
stages through the next three years. As
our skills and resources flourish over these years, so, too, they will offer
seamless service to the future of Christ and His people
I
ask you to pray for our resident Jesuits, for our lay men and women colleagues,
and for all those whom God will invite to join us in an experience of divine
grace in the coming months.
No comments:
Post a Comment