Spirituality

Thank you for being here this week. I am very conscious of the great effort behind a meeting like this. That is why I thank every one of you. I also thank Xavier and Rossana for all the coordination they have done to prepare the meeting.

For many years as I grew up, I lived by the conviction that my destiny was to develop myself in the engineering career. I grew up in a mining town, in Mufulira, Zambia and seeing the prospering lives of engineers of all kinds who worked for the mines, I felt attracted to the good life that those engineers led. At the same time, I grew up in a very Catholic family and so from very early on I had a strong desire to become a priest. So, for the first three decades of my life, my vision of life oscillated between serving my own personal career goals and the deeper goals of serving God and humanity.

“Paradoxically, it is among those who most intimately know the power of death that we find the most stubborn faith in the power of life and, therefore, in the power of the God who is the source of life.”

Inspired by a meditation oft-revisited over the course of his life, this prayer by Jacques Couture SJ (GLC) adopts the point-of-view of Jesus, in the expression of his compassion before the crowds found in Chapter 25 of Matthew’s Gospel.

When studying to be an engineer, I was moved by the commitment of the staff of the ATD Fourth World movement, who lived alongside very poor families, struggling side-by-side to realise change for them in society.

Mr. Vieng is a strong, 57 year old man from Laos. I knew him in 2009 in the prison in Thailand, where I work for the Jesuit Ministry. Vieng is a very hardworking and humble man who loves planting and gardening

In 1988, the year of the Seoul Olympics, I graduated from college and immediately entered the Society of Jesus. As we novices were beginning the second year of novitiate we made a 19th annotation "spiritual exercises in daily life."

“Progetto Scampia” was launched in the year 2001, in response to the requests of the Superiors of the Society, who greatly wanted an apostolic presence of the Jesuits in this district located in the North of Naples, renowned for its very high crime rate.

The guiding principle of the 32nd General Congregation of the Society of Jesus (1974/75): Our identity is realised in action for faith and justice. This direction was difficult to grasp for many German-speaking Jesuits. Two new communities (Frankfurt/M and Berlin) were to put these social and spiritual objectives into practice.

Prayer at the Summit takes place 13 kilometers from Santa María Chiquimula, on Guatemala’s high plateau. It is a sign that it is still possible to keep hope alive for peace in Guatemala.