Fifty years ago, when I entered the Society of Jesus, I knew that I would pray. It came with the territory. I had heard about Jesuits spending an hour each day "in prayer," but I had no idea what it meant. Unlike most Jesuits, I didn't begin my Jesuit life as a novice. Until about thirty years ago, all brothers began their Jesuit lives as postulants. A postulant was simply a candidate to the Society of Jesus. He wasn't technically a Jesuit nor did he wear the distinctive garb of that time, the black cassock. During the six months that I was a postulant, I read the New Testament and lives of the saints, but I wasn't introduced to prayer. But I remember listening to novices talking about what they did as novices and, among other things, they talked about prayer. Although they used a lot of words I didn't understand, I understood enough to realize that prayer was something I wanted to be a part of. If they did it, I said to myself, well, so too would I. And so I discovered - somewhat on my own - prayer.
I can't speak about other Jesuits. Perhaps for them prayer has always been an effort, a struggle they daily contend with. For me, however, prayer was something I took to like a fish takes to water, something I have loved from the very first day. Yet prayer was never anything that I did or any skill that I had. Rather it was what God did in me. It is awkward to speak about falling in love with God, yet that is what happened. No, it didn't happen overnight. It unfolded over time, but it happened. And in my Jesuit life, that has made all the difference.
There's a beautiful scene toward the end of Robert Bolt's play, A Man for All Seasons. Thomas More has been imprisoned in the Tower of London by King Henry VIII, and events seem to be turning against him. His beloved daughter, Margaret, has come to visit him. She's trying to find some way for him to swear to the Act of Succession, but he refuses all her entreaties. Finally, she just explodes in frustration, "But in reason! Haven't you done as much as God can reasonably want?" More pauses for a moment, as if looking for words: "Well ... finally it isn't a matter of reason; finally it's a matter of love."
On a wonderful October afternoon in 1957, God surprised a high school sophomore with the desire to be a Jesuit. And over the years he has continued to surprise and delight and invite that boy-become-a-man as he has grown in his Jesuit life. The God who had once grasped him has never let go. As Thomas More said "finally it's a matter of love."
Written by: Br. Charles Jackson, S.J., LIS Associate Director
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