SJES ROME

On 29th March 2008 we had harmonised elections in the country, which were reasonably peaceful. The opposition party won the majority but the electoral commission declared that the opposition leader had failed to garner the stipulated majority of “50% plus 1 vote”.

“With my daughter getting older and my brother’s recent death, my family needs me more than ever…I don’t know what to tell my daughter when she asks me if I will be with her? I wish I could tell her not to worry… that I’ll take care of her and that everything will be alright.

I sensed their pain and aspirations in our sharing stories about growing up in our respective ethnic communities. We were at the Jesuit Companions in Indigenous Ministry (JCIM) gathering in September at the Seven Fountains Jesuit Retreat house in Chiangmai, Thailand,

I remember my first visit to the Klong Prem Prison Hospital with Father Olivier in April 2009 (two months before I started full time Prison Ministry that June). We approached each prisoner patient and gave him a few things such as toiletry articles and cookies.

In 1999, after spending my regency in Cambodia, where I accompanied and assisted refugees who were disabled or elderly, I returned to the Province of Loyola, to which I belong. Those years in Cambodia were a time of grace: there was interior distress at seeing so much suffering,

When I started my legal ministry among the Adivasis/Tribals/Indigenous Peoples in Gujarat, India, as part of the SHAKTI-LAHRC Jesuit human rights centre, I had a feeling somewhat similar to that of our Master when he said “They were like sheep without a shepherd”.

London Jesuit Volunteers is a recent initiative of the Mount Street Jesuit Centre in London. Members commit to volunteering for 2-8 hours per week, working alongside people in prisons, hospitals, and homeless shelters; also with communities of people with learning disabilities,

Most of my workdays are spent in front of a computer. This is not a complaint; merely a mere statement of fact. As a policy and advocacy officer for JRS-Europe, my tasks are more research- and policy-intensive than people-intensive. Of course, part of my job is to meet policymakers.

My arrival in Chile, on the way to theology studies, could not have been more “earth- shaking” than it was. Two hours after I arrived, there passed from this world Renato Poblete SJ, who bore witness of the social apostolate to this province as it was meeting to reflect on the apostolic frontiers to which we are all called.

Kandhamal is deadly beautiful. A tropical forest, but with close mountains and deep valleys, and a climate that can get alpine in winter, without the snow. The topography of this plateau in the middle of the Indian province of Orissa may have saved the lives of tens of thousands of Christians who fled to the forests as mobs with murder, arson and rape on their minds, attacked 300 villages on 25 August 2008.