Sunday Afternoon with Some Jesuits

I have a good friend and mentor who's a Jesuit in the Georgetown community. Unfortunately, he's been battling a bad diagnosis this summer that has put him under the knife, in the hospital, and kept him out of the classroom for this fall semester (never a good thing for Jesuits). Now that I'm back at school, I've been visiting him, this afternoon included.

There are many things I enjoy about the Jesuits: they are generally speaking incredibly smart, or at least extraordinarily well-educated; they are the "Jedis" of the Church, seemingly using their powers of mind to challenge all evil in the world and school people in the proper way (not such a bad analogy, actually); and they are the old guys that "get it," about everything. I've had a few Jesuit priests in my family, and as my mother likes to remind me, there's nothing you can tell a Jesuit that he hasn't heard before. They'll dine with you, drink with you, and then they'll get you in line for heaven; what more could you want from a friend?

Here's what I enjoy most, though: the dialogue. When my boyfriend and I got to the "Jes Res," we sat down with my mentor and some of the other men in the community for a few hours. As my boyfriend said about his conversation with one Jesuit, "He sure packs a lot into a five minute talk." And indeed, the Jesuit had told him about a class he had taught, a theater and Catholic imagination course. The personal monologues his students came to tell the class were profound and inspiring -- one young man told of how he had learned to forgive again after his father had been killed on 9/11. Another Jesuit spoke to me about how many young people he had married over the years, and how he had kept in touch with them all through the ups and downs of their lives. My mentor and I discussed an article he had emailed me about theism and new discoveries in astrophysics. I told him about my disagreements with a professor over the historical context of political liberalism and the "principles" of justice outlined by John Rawls; that reminded him of another article he has in mind for me to read about the status of education in American universities.

I had gone to Mass before heading over to see the Jesuits, but I have to say that it was dialogue with the Jesuits that provided the greatest opportunity for self-reflection today. Who else could weave astrophysics and political philosophy into theology, while keeping the conversation as seemingly light as that about the weather? I can't help but be grateful to know these guys, for their humanity, their insight, and their community. So far as a Catholic education is different from any other kind, it's due to guides like them.

I don't know much about how this whole blogging thing works yet, but I guess that's my thought for the day.