One month into General Congregation 36, the delegates have elected four Assistants ad Providentiam – Fr Fratern Masawe, Fr Vernon D’Cunha, Fr Douglas Marcouiller and Fr John Dardis. Fr Marcouiller was also elected as Admonitor to the Superior General.
Within 48 hours of his election as the 31st Superior General of the Society of Jesus, Fr Arturo Sosa SJ sat down for an extensive interview with the GC36 media team in Rome. Having received 30 questions in advance, he faced the cameras on the afternoon of Sunday, October 16.
Pope Francis joined the delegates of General Congregation 36 in the aula on October 24. There is a well-established tradition that on the occasion of a Jesuit General Congregation, the Holy Father meets with the delegates and this has happened as an audience in the rooms of the Vatican. This Jesuit Pope chose to go to the Jesuit Curia to meet his Jesuit brothers.
He was greeted upon arrival by Father General Arturo Sosa and the superior of the Jesuit Roman Curia community Fr Joaquín Barrero and led to the aula where he joined the delegates for morning prayer.
The Korean Jesuit Province is offering a programme to help scholastics and brothers-in-formation understand the real situation of migrants in an industrialised society like Korea, and the urgency of the issues they face. The programme will be run by Yiutsari, the Jesuit migrant centre located in Gimpo.
From December 17 to January 1, 25 Jesuit scholastics from across the Jesuit Conference of Asia Pacific gathered in Tacloban City – one of the areas hardest hit by Super Typhoon Haiyan –to learn about disaster risk reduction and management, the theme of the 2015 Scholastics and Brothers Circle Workshop. After talks, immersion and reflection, they each had to write a plan for disaster risk reduction and management in their own context. Myanmar scholastic Paul Tu Ja SJ shares this reflection on his experience.
A more perfect learning environment would have been hard to find for the recent Scholastics and Brothers Circle meeting. With Disaster Risk Reduction and Management for a theme, Tacloban – one of the areas hardest hit by Super Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda in the Philippines) in November 2013 – was the logical location. During their workshop from December 18 and 30, the 25 Jesuit scholastics from across the Asia Pacific Conference were able to see with their own eyes the situation in Tacloban two years after the disaster. They visited reconstructed sites, and met with local comm
Filipino scholastic Richard Fernando SJ lived in Arrupe International Residence (AIR) from 1994 to 1995. He went to Cambodia for his Regency, and died in Banteay Prieb at the age of 26 while trying to prevent a student from releasing a grenade at the vocational institute. As AIR celebrates its Silver Jubilee, we remember one of the house’s martyrs.
Since the historic elections in November 2015, there has been a wave of optimism for national reconciliation, which may allow for Burmese refugees who fled to camps on the Thailand-Myanmar border decades ago to return.
A painting thought to be of St Francis Xavier SJ – and believed to have been lost almost 250 years ago – has been rediscovered at the Royal Scots College, Salamanca in Spain.
Loyola University Chicago and its Board of Trustees have approved the implementation of the Magis Scholarship Fund, a student-led initiative to support undocumented undergraduate students in the United States. The Board of Trustees finance committee voted unanimously earlier this month to approve the initiative, which will raise approximately USD 50,000 each academic year.