So how do we make the tough decisions in life?

Last Thursday, a group of 30 young adults gathered at Holy Name to hear Fr. Pat McGrath, SJ speak at the Living Ignatian evening titled "Finding God in the Hard Questions."

He gave a fantastic overview of how we should be making our decisions based on what we would do if Jesus was standing next to us.

Check out his talk on YouTube.
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-Lauren G

The Paschal Mystery Alive Today

Lord, as this bread was formed
From many different stalks of wheat
Which were picked, crushed, ground and baked
That it might be one loaf,

As this wine was fashioned from many grapes
Picked in different parts of the field,
Crushed, fermented in darkness and aged
That it might be one sweet drink,

So we pray that we who are many and different
By the joy we share and the sorrow we endure
Might be formed into a people of praise
For the glory of Your name.

Our Lenten and Easter observances are meant to remind us of the transforming power of the Holy Spirit at work in Jesus’ life. And they are meant to stir our faith in the great hope that the same will be true for us. St. Paul wrote in Galatians 2, “I have been crucified with Christ, yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me.”

These words sound so beautiful, don’t they? Yet the process of this truth is no less than the dying and rising of Christ within us. God is at work fashioning and forming us, like the bread and wine at Mass, into a more perfect representation of the Body of Christ. It is one thing to affirm this in the abstract. It is quite another to live this through the suffering of our lives.

Nowhere have I seen this Paschal Mystery more perfectly realized than in the death of my dear brother priest, Fr. Jim Willig. Fr. Jim and I were best friends, and for years we led pilgrimages around the world to holy sites. Ten years ago this summer, we returned from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to discover that Jim had developed renal cell cancer, a particularly deadly strain because it usually shows no symptoms until it is too late. In the operation, they discovered a football size tumor that had metastasized and traveled to his lungs.

Jim wanted to live. He didn’t want “early retirement” as he put it. But as Fr. Jim’s body grew weaker and weaker, his faith grew stronger and stronger. His voice became more and more frail, but his parish became larger and larger. Daily Fr. Jim would pray St. Ignatius’ famous prayer: “Take, Lord, receive all my liberty, my memory, my will, my entire self. All I have you have given to me. Now I return it to be used only according to your will. Give me only your love and your grace. With these I am rich enough and desire nothing more.”

For the first year of the cancer journey, Fr. Jim could only pray these words and half mean them. He wanted a physical healing, and he continued to beg God for this grace. But a year and a half into his sickness, Fr. Jim’s heart surrendered more completely to the transformation that God was working in him. He started to pray: "I don’t know what my future holds, but I know who holds my future."

With this change in attitude came a profound change in Fr. Jim’s spirit. He went from being a good priest to an extraordinarily holy priest. He went from being a very good preacher to an extraordinarily powerful man of God. We began to see so clearly Christ at work in Fr. Jim’s life.

When he died, just about two years after his diagnosis, there was no one who knew him who doubted that Fr. Jim was taking his place among God’s saints. Fr. Jim had chronicled this remarked transformation in a book entitled Lessons from the School of Suffering.

All of us want to grow into the image and likeness of Christ. That is the goal of our faith. We are called to this transformation not just as individuals but also as Church, as the people of God. And the surest way to allow this transformation to occur is to walk the path of suffering in faith as Jesus did. This Paschal Mystery is not just about what occurred to Jesus two thousand years ago. It is the pattern of every Christian who embraces Jesus call to “Pick up your cross and follow.” (Mt 16:24)

During this Holy Week and into the Easter season, with every Mass we attend and every communion we receive, let us pray for a deeper surrender to God’s will in our lives that “in the joy we share and the sorrow we endure, we might be formed into a people of praise for the glory of your name.”

-Fr J. Michael Sparough, SJ

Lessons from the School of Suffering is available through Heart to Heart.

Sunday Nights

Most people dread Sunday night because it means the weekend is ending. I however have been looking forward to my Sunday nights for the last several weeks. No, it is not the new episodes of Desperate House Wives or the break in the Lenten fast that Sundays provide; I look forward to Sunday nights because I am part of a small faith-sharing group through Charis Ministries held at St. Andrew’s Parish.

Each week I attend the 5:30 Mass at St. Andrew’s, my home parish, and then have a few minutes to reflect on the Mass before joining my group. Our group structure is based on a format provided by Charis Ministries but led by the Holy Sprit. People come to share their struggles, bring new perspective to the group and discuss where they are at on their journey of Faith. When a member shares their struggles it allows the others a chance to pray for that individual and offers insight to one’s own life. While we may not know each other outside the group and are all coming from different backgrounds, it is amazing how closely connected you can feel to others when you have come together in Christ.

I leave the prayer groups pumped up for my coming week and have new thoughts and prayers floating in my head, I love hearing how other people are doing on their journey of faith and having the opportunity to share my own journey.

- Tina F.

Living Ignatian Series Lives Online!

Many of you are already familiar with our Living Ignation Series. To follow St. Ignatius' instruction to "find God in all things" we've offered service events, speaker presenations and worship opportunities.

Did you happen to miss Claire Noonan in October or Mike Hayes in February? Well, now you can catch up by enjoying these podcasts.

Finding God in the Every Day: Claire Noonan
Click to listen >>> Part I & Part II
Claire Noonan of the Siena Center of Dominican University talks about finding God in our every day experiences, and leads us through an Examen. Her talk is posted on mycatholicvoice.com, a new online resource for spiritual media, in two parts. We're excited to be a part of this new online Catholic community!

Finding God in the Crossroads: Mike Hayes
Click to listen >>> Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 / Part 5 / Part 6 / Part 7 / Part 8 / Part 9
Ok, so Mike Hayes of BustedHalo.com split up his talk into MANY different parts. But it's video! The talk is posted on good ol' fashioned YouTube.

Let us know what you think! Email us with your opinions of the talks themselves and the podcasts.

Don't miss our next speaker, Fr. Pat McGrath, SJ, as he talks about Finding God in the Hard Questions on April 23.

-Lauren B.

Part of a Larger Piece

I had a chance to catch up with our friends in Pontotoc, Mississippi the other day. Quite a lot has been going on since we left in July! Despite the hard times, Habitat for Humanity has stopped work at all.

When our group departed in last July, we were pretty proud of the fact that we framed the whole house, put up walls and put together the roof. But our work was only one piece of the puzzle. Thanks to the staff and many other volunteers, the skeleton of a house was completed in just last month. The new home is complete with cabinets, painted walls, windows, the whole nine yards - all sorts of things that many people worked hard to finish.

We were lucky enough to meet the Chaperno family before we left Pontotoc, and we're delighted to see and hear about the house dedication ceremony. So much work, so many people, so much time - and Habitat for Humanity keeps on doing it.

If you'd like to have this kind of experience this summer, find out how to sign up for the 2009 Pontotoc Service Trip.

I think you'll find that it's wonderfully overwhelming to be part of something larger than yourself.

-Lauren B.

A morning in Humboldt Park

On Saturday morning, a group of young adults from Charis Ministries and Old St. Pat's braved the rain to help out at the mobile food pantry at the Mission of Our Lady of the Angels in the Humboldt Park neighborhood. We started by serving breakfast to the neighbors and chatting with them while they ate. Then the truck arrived from the Greater Chicago Food Depository and we were able to sort through the food and then help the neighbors select their produce and pack it up to take home.

There were so many volunteers from different organizations that over 200 people had breakfast and picked up their food in less than two hours. After we were done, Fr. Bob Lombardo, CFR, the founder of the Mission, gave us a tour of Kelly Hall and described all the programs they offer to the neighbors. They provide everything from basketball programs to after school tutoring to a workout facility for the elderly. As one 27 year resident of the neighborhood put it, "the Mission is restoring hope to a neighborhood that has been through a lot."

It is truly amazing to see what has been done in just a few short years through the partnerships between the Mission, different organizations, and the neighbors. Go to the website to check out the programs and volunteer opportunities they have available and join us for our next Service Day!

-Lauren G

Were You There ... ?

Many of us commenced our Lenten journey on Saturday at the Catholic Theological Union during Charis Ministries’ annual Lenten Day of Reflection. Fr. Joseph Brown, SJ, expert theologian specializing in African-American spirituality, history, and culture, guided us through a day of challenging and consoling grace. Paralleling the suffering of Christ to that of slavery in this country, Fr. Brown’s spirited and animated presentations challenged us to answer the Gospel’s call to work for justice in a country and world riddled with discrimination, inequality, and suffering.

The day was centered around powerful live-performances of African American spirituals, ranging from a moving solo of “Motherless Child” to an upbeat version “This Little Light of Mine." Fr. Brown reflected that these spirituals characterize the dignity and faith upheld by the slaves, despite the cruel oppression and abuse to which they were subjected. The music and reflections encouraged us to be moved and humbled by this dignity as we are by the dignity of Christ’s life, suffering, and death.

As Fr. Brown reminded us, Jesus’ persecution and sacrifice resulted from his commitment to overturning the social order and liberating the oppressed. Lent calls us to bear witness to the love and commitment to social justice personified in Jesus’ life, suffering, and death. May this witness move us to recognize our responsibility to follow Christ’s example of liberating the oppressed and marginalized in our world today in the hope of creating the Kingdom of God here on Earth.

Many thanks to Fr. Brown, the awe-inspiring musicians, and our co-hosts Catholics on Call and The Tolton Scholars Program, without whom the day would not have been possible!

-Mary Ellen M.