The Musical Priest

As one who derives a great deal of his identity from his Irish heritage, it may sound like apostasy but: I hate Saint Patrick's Day. Well, hate is a strong word. Strongly dislike? Really struggle with? I don't know where to place it, really, but it seems to me that it falls someplace between getting a filling without anesthesia and watching Miley Cyrus twerk on national television. I didn't always feel this way. When we were kids, the whole month of March was filled with excitement. We were hauled all over Cleveland to perform at senior centers, parish dinners, and grade schools. On Saint Patrick's Day itself, the fife & drum corp would march into Saint Coleman's Church and then, afterward, we'd march in the parade. Once in high school, I started playing at "paying" gigs and would make a few hundred dollars for a day's worth of music. I haven't performed on Saint Patrick's Day since...2003, I think. It's not necessarily becaus...

For those interested, journalist Daniel Burke recently interviewed several of us at the Boston College School of Theology and Ministry for an article entitled " How to Really Measure the 'Francis Effect '". I happen to be quoted along with several of my Jesuit brothers. I'm posting the picture from the website -- it's pretty snazzy! Photo: Webb Chappell for CNN

Without fail, every time I read the "First Principle and Foundation" of the Spiritual Exercises , I feel a jolt of excitement. I have a distinct memory of reading it in some vocation literature back when I was a senior in high school.  In everyday life, then, we must hold ourselves in balance before all of these created gifts insofar as we have a choice and are not bound by some obligation. We should not fix our desires on health or sickness, wealth or poverty, success or failure, to be considered somebody important or a nobody, a long life or a short one. For everything has the potential of calling forth in us a deeper response to our life in God. Our only desire and our one choice should be this: I want and I choose what better leads to the deepening of God's life in me.   When things are going well in my life, I have no difficulty in saying, "Yes, everything  does draw me closer to God!" When things are going less well, when I'm feeling tired or st...

Throughout the world, the Christian faithful celebrate today the beginning of Lent. Marked with ashes, they embark upon a forty-day journey of prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and conversion as they move toward the horror of Good Friday and the triumph of Easter. For me, this is an especially meaningful Lenten season. Since October I have been working with an outstanding group of women and men at Saint Cecilia Parish  to prepare them for full reception into the Catholic Church. It is a true testimony to the power of the Spirit, and the tenacity human perseverance, that they have come so far in growing in their friendship with Jesus. It's easy, I reckon, for many of us to start out Lent much as we begin the New Year: with a list of resolutions, of things we're going to give up, of hopes to help re-create ourself. We start with a sizable list and if we "do" one of those things, we cross it from the list and try to preserve our other "resolutions" until, after...

I apologize for the long absence from writing: it was a hectic February, in all sorts of ways, but I'm glad now to have a few days of Spring Break to re-organize. For those looking for spiritual reading this Lent, please allow me to suggest Gerhard Lohfink's new No Irrelevant Jesus: On Jesus and the Church Today . I began the book this morning with a commitment to reading one chapter each day. Normally, I devour books such as this but, in attempt to have a more reflective attitude toward the text, I'm going to take it slowly. The first chapter, provocatively entitled "On Not Taming Jesus," rejects the tendency to reduce Christianity to a message of self-acceptance. In a riff on Matthew 22:39, Lohfink writes You shall love God, you shall love your neighbor and you shall love yourself - in fact, you shall first of all love yourself, because otherwise you can love neither God nor your neighbor.  The problem with this, Lohfink writes, is that it assumes Jesus ...

It is with great joy, and tremendous relief, that I can share that I've been accepted to Boston College's doctoral program in systematic theology. I interviewed almost two weeks ago and heard yesterday afternoon. Throughout my years of Jesuit formation, it has become increasingly clear to me that I have both a desire and passion for higher studies in theology and I'm so enormously grateful that I will have the opportunity to begin these studies. I'll spare you the details of exactly what  I hope to study: in addition to being boring to most people, it changes within me each day! I will share, however, why  I love studying theology. I love the study of theology because it was through the guidance of a theologian that I learned to pray. Years ago, when I was in college, I bought a copy of Karl Rahner's The Need and Blessing of Prayer . As I recall, I was a senior in college and my roommate was working overnight shifts at a local FedEx. One evening, after I'...

In the wake of Philip Seymour Hoffman's death last week, there has been no shortage of stories addressing the alarming rise in the use of heroin, especially among teenagers. CNN provides a "snapshot" of the epidemic in a story focusing on heroin use among teens in Long Island.  Tellingly the author writes, "Parents are caught between denial and shame over the stigma of having a heroin-addicted child." This makes sense: what community isn't proud when the local kid succeeds by getting to play a professional sport, getting into medical school, or achieving success in some field? It's easier to say to friends, "My son the lawyer" or "My daughter the professor" than it is to say "My son who struggles with addiction." This may arise from a "But what will the neighbors say?" mentality. I've seen it with families where a child is gay or lesbian; where a child struggles with alcohol or drugs; where kids struggl...