Pilgrims

Summertime is pilgrim time, and Spain is prime pilgrim territory for sites related to the Society of Jesus. Two pilgrim routes converged in Madrid on July 1, both from Jesuit high schools.

A group of alumni and parents led by Fr. Kenneth Boller, SJ, president of New York's Xavier High School, began its pilgrimage in Barcelona, which is close to Montserrat, where Ignatius Loyola in 1522 laid his knight's sword at the foot of the Black Madonna, and to Manresa, where Ignatius began formulating what later became the Spiritual Exercises. The pilgrims then went to Xavier Castle (pictured at the right), birthplace of Francis Xavier, and to Loyola, home of Ignatius. From there they moved on to Madrid.

The other group, organized by Fr. James Stoeger, SJ, of the Chicago Province staff, included pilgrims from four high schools and other ministries in the province. They began in Madrid and traveled toward Barcelona and later visited Jesuit sites in Italy.

Some from both Jesuit groups met in Madrid and celebrated their time together. Fr. Terrence Baum, SJ, bridged the two groups: after six years as headmaster at Xavier High in New York he was taking up the same position at Loyola Academy in Wilmette, Ill. He found it moving to visit Jesuit holy places with people drawn deeper into the Jesuit heritage. "I was very much taken by the love of the Society that these people showed and by their reverence toward the Jesuit holy sites," he reflected; "it was quite beautiful to experience."

The dynamic of pilgrimage is to visit, to think, to pray, and to share the road for a time with others, strangers or friends, on the same quest. But after a short time together, as pilgrims always do, these groups too moved on.

Down Under

Some 300 Jesuit alumni from 31 countries gathered in Sydney, Australia, last July for the 5th Congress of the World Union of Jesuit Alumni. They were there to discuss what values they should bring to the 21st century. Jesuit General Fr. Peter-Hans Kolvenbach spoke about the responsibilities of Jesuit alumni, asserting that financially supporting one's school, sharing in professional development, and reminiscing about school days are legitimate and wonderful things for alumni to do.

Jesuit alumni, however, "are called to a goal beyond this," Fr. Kolvenbach said, recalling that Fr. Pedro Arrupe "formulated that goal as becoming 'men and women for others.' Highlighting the Ignatian ideal of service, [Arrupe] pointed to the need for all former students to humanize the world."

These themes resounded in the keynote address by Georgetown University's Fr. William Byron, SJ, who asserted that our lives should be guided by four principles: commitment, responsibility for the life of society, cultivation of virtue, and generous service of others.

Delegates reported just how well these principles are being lived out by Jesuit alumni in many countries.

Design

Architect Steve Holl chose "a gathering of different lights" as the guiding concept for the design of Seattle University's new chapel of St. Ignatius. Lenses set in baffles in the walls bathe the chapel's interior in pools of natural light.

Holl's design won an award from the New York chapter of the American Institute of Architects; the scale model of the chapel is now part of the permanent collection at New York's Museum of Modern Art.

Tercentenary

Baja California was preeminently Jesuit territory until the Jesuits' expulsion in 1767. This October, the people of the peninsula are celebrating the 300th anniversary of the founding of Loreto by Fr. Juan Maria Salvatierra, SJ, the first of more than 21 missions and visitas, or mission stations. (Pictured right is St. Javier Viggé, the most imposing Jesuit mission on the peninsula, built in the 1750s by Fr. Miguel del Barco, SJ.) Although these missions and visitas were distant and isolated from other Jesuit apostolates on the mainland, they played an important role in the expansion of missionary activity in northwestern Mexico.

Californianos share a rare pride in the dedicated service of the 60-some Jesuits from Europe and the Americas, including Fr. Eusebio Kino from Trent and Fr. Juan Ugarte from Honduras, who spent their lives in one of the most difficult assignments in the Colonial era. Perhaps a modern blackrobe or two may wander there this year to find inspiration from the living memory of the Society's heroic past. CONTRIBUTED BY FR. CHARLES POLZER, SJ

Fiat Lux

Fr. Joseph Neri, SJ (1836-1919), one of the early experimenters with electricity, became the chairman of the natural sciences department at San Francisco's St. Ignatius College (now the University of San Francisco) in 1870.

To illustrate his lectures on electricity, Fr. Neri constructed the first storage battery ever set up in San Francisco; his exhibitions of electric lighting in the 1870s attracted wide attention. On July 4, 1876, the centennial of the Declaration of Independence, Fr. Neri illuminated Market Street with arc lights and Foucault's lamps and reflectors -- the first exhibition of public arc lighting on the Pacific coast. It preceded by a decade its use in other parts of the world.

(By contrast, Thomas Edison developed the first commercially practical incandescent lamp in 1879. Edison's design for a complete electrical distribution system for lighting and power culminated in the installation [1881-82] of the world's first central electric power plant in New York.)

An eloquent speaker, Fr. Neri would accompany his exhibitions with lectures in which he anticipated the brilliant future in store for the electric motor. CONTRIBUTED BY MARLON VILLA

Homecoming

"I wasn't too excited about going to a nursing home," remembers Tampa Jesuit High School junior Scott Perrin, "but it turned out to be something different altogether." Scott was talking about the way Tampa Jesuit celebrated homecoming last year. The event used to include a pep rally, football game, dance, and the crowning of the queen, but Tampa Jesuit shifted homecoming's focus to community service last year. Students took a day to visit with special-ed grade schoolers, play basketball with patients at a Shriners' hospital, and visit nursing home residents, as Scott did. The school also hosted a carnival for the people at the sites visited during the week; homeroom classes built dart-throw, dunk-tank, and free-throw booths, among many others, including a snake display.

Community service is a year-round activity for Jesuit High students, but this year's homecoming will be the second in a row with a week-long emphasis on service. CONTRIBUTED BY JEFF ROGO

New Priest

Fr. Grant Garinger, SJ, was ordained to the priesthood on September 13 at Gesu Church in Milwaukee. Fr. Garinger graduated from St. Louis University with bachelor's degrees in philosophy and painting. He taught religion, English, and art at Creighton Prep in Omaha. He is working on the campus ministry staff at Marquette University in Milwaukee and plans on pursuing an MFA in theater.