A Global Partnership Initiative of the Jesuit Schools Network
|
|
JSN ADOPTS SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE INVESTMENT POLICY
|
The Board of Directors of the Jesuit Schools Network has adopted a socially responsible investment (SRI) policy for managing the Network’s investment portfolio. Upon the recommendation of the investment and finance committees, the Board adopted the new policy at its September 2020 meeting in Baltimore.
The new policy is based on the Socially Responsible Investment Guidelines of the Catholic Bishops of the United States. According to the Bishops, “Socially responsible investing is a holistic framework that sees economic development intrinsically linked to integral human development and good stewardship of God’s creation.” Managed, in part, according to Environmental, Social, and Governance Criteria (ESG), the JSN policy affirms the Board’s fiduciary role in generating funds that support school participation in Network programming while also ensuring investments are consistent with JSN’s identity as a Catholic and Jesuit apostolate.
While the ESG approach aligns well with Catholic social teaching and the Bishops’ guidelines, the JSN will omit those investments in which ESG and the Bishops do not align. This typically occurs in the area of biotechnology and the protection and preservation of human life. In the new policy, the JSN can eliminate these types of investments, thus complementing ESG standards and complying with Church teaching. Before making the overall change in September, the JSN consulted moral theologians to ensure the Network’s new approach would be consistent with Church teaching.
By implementing this new policy, JSN joins other Jesuit apostolates and Provinces who hold similar SRI policies. In 2016, for example, the Jesuits of Canada adopted a socially responsible approach by divesting themselves of investments in fossil fuels. In making this decision, then-Provincial Peter Bisson, S.J. stated, “For the Jesuits, it is a pressing issue of justice for our time. We are being called to take a stand.” Therefore, in addition to implementing our own SRI policy, JSN is pleased to join our colleagues in promoting the values and goals of socially responsible investing.
|
|
VIRTUAL COFFEE SHOP: LAUDATO SI' ACTION PLATFORM AND UAP4 |
On Tuesday, February 8, at 3:00PM Eastern Time, the JSN will welcome Michael Downs to lead this important conversation, who serves as Director of Justice and Kinship at Bishop O'Dowd High School in Oakland. He is also a member of the California Catholic Conference's Environmental Stewardship Committee and the Vatican's Laudato Si Action Platform Working Group.
|
|
IGNATIAN SOLIDARITY NETWORK UNVEILS THE LAUDATO SI ACTION PLAN
|
The Laudato Si Action Platform (LSAP) is one way that we can collectively continue our journey to Care for our Common Home and live out UAP 4. The framework provides an opportunity to create a unique action plan in your school around seven goals during the next seven years. Ensuring the future of our planet can sometimes feel like paralyzing work, but the good news is that the problem is so big that ALL of our own talents and interests, along with those of our students, are integral to this great collective work. In the words of Gonzaga High School alum Paul Campion, "There is so much to win!" as we think about our work to create an abundant future for all of creation.
The LSAP is a framework to help us reflect on the work we're already doing (it's definitely happening at your school in small and large ways) and to imagine the types of learning communities and world we would like to create. Included are a concise timeline of the LSAP, a summary of the 7 goals and an opportunity to learn more about the LSAP with the Ignatian Solidarity Network, and a three step summary of the suggested process for enrolling and engaging in the LSAP.
|
|
A GLOBAL TASTE OF CULTURE
|
In the ongoing celebration of the Ignatian Year, students at St. Ignatius College Prep in Chicago, IL inaugurated a program entitled a "Taste of Culture." The event was a collaboration by the Diversity Club and the Culinary Club. It was an opportunity to experience global appreciation of culinary cuisine from various cultures. When St. Ignatius sent his missionary companions into the world—“Ite, inflammate omnia”—they not only experienced different countries, communities and cultures, but also cuisines.
The event offered a variety of ways to cultivate global cultural awareness around cultural ethic cuisines and diverse food of various cultures.
During the event, over 100 students enjoyed diverse dishes and ethnic entrees while engaged in conversations across a multicultural menu of topics touching on how they experience and value food (e.g., favorite burrito by Abuelita; traditional family staples; delectable desserts passed down from the homeland; savory soul food and its historical roots and the intersection of food safety, security, and social justice). Included were "table topics" where students listened and learned about the global nature of food and reflected on the impact of climate change on food sourcing and availability. Offering, sharing and gathering around food can be a means to enact and embody companionship, kinship, friendship and global citizenship. As a universal body in Christ, all our bodies need food. This multicultural awareness allowed students to see their global connection to all other students around the world who also need this global resource that our common earth provides in abundance
Finding God in all things: faith (Catholicism), family (community) and food (communion) is the core of Ignatian Jesuit charism. Similarly, coming together to break bread around various ethnic foods (diversity), shared with and among others (equity), to foster a culture of collaboration, common ground and communion (inclusion) was a delicious way to put faith in action while promoting global social justice.
|
|
“People truly construct a sense of home when they have control over their daily activities which empower themselves and the people around them. Displaced persons are often cast into contexts characterized by uncertainty, unpredictability, and insecurity—yet, the everyday activities of cooking and communing represent a vital routine.
While traditional foods may be a marker of national celebration and remembrance, the daily meal—shared among newcomers and natives alike—is truly the binding thread of community & culture.” — Abigail, JRS South Africa
Join Jesuit Refugee Service/USA in celebrating food from across the world! Download your copy of the JRS Cookbook today!
|
|
GESU SCHOOL SWAPS GAMES WITH BRAZILIAN JESUIT SCHOOL
|
Gesu School was contacted by Colégio Anchieta about a video exchange focused on games that their students (4-5 years old) like to play and games our students at Gesu (pre-K & Kindergarten; same age group) like to play. Both schools produced videos. Colégio Anchieta had been working on the project (and their English!) for some time. Gesu was under a tight schedule with holidays and the impending summer break for Colégio Anchieta. However, thankfully, we did not have to master any Portuguese! The schools exchanged videos over the past few days and it was a great success. Both schools learned more about themselves, especially as part of the Jesuit Schools Network. Both schools learned about another school. Both schools accomplished the goal of a shared video in English to provide connection to their new school partners and an opportunity to practice vocabulary and pronunciation. Both schools hope to continue the collaboration in the future!
It was truly a spiritual moment as well, where we concretely realized that, as Fr. Arturo Sosa, S.J. puts it, "there is a place for everyone because we recognize each other as sister and brother, sons and daughters of the same, unique Father." It was a great joy to work with the teachers and administrators of Colégio Anchieta and to witness the marvel that is always a new thing through a child's eyes. Sharing the video was truly a marvelous moment!
|
|
500 YEARS OF THE IGNATIAN WAY
|
The Jubilee Year 2022 of the Ignatian Way begins!
“In this Ignatian Year we recover our condition as pilgrims. To underline experientially this dimension of the pilgrim Saint Ignatius, we have arranged for a JUBILEE YEAR OF COMMEMORATION to be celebrated in 2022 along the Ignatian Way, understood as a continuous experience of the Spiritual Exercises, which will take place from January 1 to December 31 of the year. 2022.” — Pastoral Letter of the Bishops of the Ignatian Way, July 31, 2021
On January 2, in the Sanctuary of La Cova de Sant Ignasi, Manresa, the acts in honor of the first pilgrim of the Ignatian Way, Íñigo de Loyola, began. A vocal concert by the Fifth Essence quartet opened this jubilee year. The mayor of Manresa, Mr. Marc Aloy, highlighted in his presentation of the events that “[t]he commemoration of the 500 years of Ignacio's stay in Manresa helps us to vindicate his spirit, his strength, his desire to be transformed. The objective is to transform ourselves individually, each one of us, and also collectively, as a city, as a society (…) Let us soak up the spirit of transformation to project ourselves towards a better future.”
For Saint Ignatius, this pilgrimage meant the beginning of a new life, reconciling himself with his past life, accepting the Justice of God’s Love and opening himself to the will of the Lord.
Let's live the Jubilee as Ignatian pilgrims!
|
|
THE GLOBAL REACH AND NECESSITY OF LANGSTON HUGHES
|
Perhaps the global reach of the Harlem Renaissance starts with a trip from Missouri to Mexico a little over 100 years ago. A fresh-eyed Langston Hughes, only 19 and very much alive. Or very much a survivor of a 1920’s influenza pandemic or the 1919 rage against Black folks leaving over 3,000 of them, mostly African American men, hanging from trees.
Perhaps these events (or running away from them) were a necessary move for Hughes so he could delight in the solace of grace and awe rolling alongside his train. The Mississippi River and the coextended miles of perspective for Hughes to dream of other waters—the Euphrates, Congo, Nile. This journey would yield one of the most anthologized poems from any American poet, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers.” This poem would inspire and join other poems, poets, and other fresh-eyed dreamers who would birth the Harlem Renaissance as a global phenomenon celebrating the intellect, philosophies, and artistic prowess of African Americans, African peoples, and their contribution to the world.
Hughes, his love, and his dedication to all Black people shine throughout the breadth of his work. Even when his writing expresses reactions to racism, the poise of Hughes brings readers directly to the facts of human dignity: you matter. “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” is a reactionary poem that can be taken as this type of eloquent meditation. Here the poem marks historic and global contribution to/for the world. In its expressed knowing, the speaker of the poem actively participates in culture and grows “deep like the rivers.” The revelation is both inspirational as a reaction to the 1919 lynchings, and aspirational, pointing forward to the future of Black folks. Award-winning poet Terrance Hayes, in his 2018 BOMB Magazine essay about Hughes, “As for Langston Hughes,” notes: “there may be no more dignified image of the Negro in all of American literature. Likewise, his manifesto, “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain,” remains a seminal part of any black poet’s education.”
This poem remains seminal, necessary for most poets and lovers of poetry. From here, Hughes’s reach extended to the Caribbean and African poets and politicians of the Negritude movement. His reach moves toward the coffee houses of Paris and the university anthologies in Germany. Even Hughes in his second autobiography, I Wonder as I Wander, expressed his surprise at the Russian and Japanese intelligentsia and their acquisition of his work.
All in all, Hughes’s career as a writer encourages concern and care for Black lives as an international charism. As we face our own pandemic woes and contemporary racial reckonings, it too might be necessary to embrace the type of charism Hughes and his peers established—beautiful differences acknowledged and celebrated as part of the human collective so no one dies or suffers because of their race.
Below is a list of organizations and links dedicated to carrying his torch, forming a sort of new renaissance of cultural dignity in the face of trauma. They support and connect their plight with African Americans in solidarity and harmony. Like Hughes, these organizations use literary arts to narrate their own ancestral and present lives as contributors to the fabric of the world’s wonderment. In this way, like Hughes, these organizations use cultural beauty as a necessary and powerful testament of joy “all golden in the sunset.”
|
|
FORDHAM PREP RESUMES INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL WITH SAFETY PROTOCOLS
|
In February 2020 a group of students accompanied by two faculty members traveled to Milan, Italy as part of our exchange program with Istituto Leone XIII. At the time, no one knew that the students and faculty would have to quarantine upon returning to the U.S. after news of the COVID outbreak in Italy, and that this would be our last international trip for almost 18 months.
This fall we were happy to once again resume international travel with our first group traveling to Clongowes Wood College in Kildare, Ireland in early November. Later in the month we welcomed students from Istituto Leone XIII to stay with Prep students and their families and attend classes here. Academic and cultural immersions programs will also resume in February and the spring.
In discerning whether to resume international travel, the health and safety of everyone involved was our top priority. We relied heavily on the advice of two doctors who have extensive backgrounds in infectious disease and who have advised our school on creating protocols since the onset of the pandemic. Those doctors encouraged us to resume international travel if the proper health and safety protocols were in place at Fordham Prep and with the schools and organizations with whom we partner.
While vaccinations and boosters certainly help to reduce the risk of someone testing positive for COVID on an international trip, we are also aware that risk has certainly risen since our November programs took place. In consultation with our host organizations, we have developed a protocol for quarantining should someone test positive before their return to the United States. One faculty chaperone is prepared in advance to remain in the country with the student during the period of isolation and accommodations for isolation have been arranged in advance should this be necessary. Both parents and students sign a special COVID waiver acknowledging the inherent risks during this continued global pandemic.
Our ability to offer these programs again is a credit to our dedicated program coordinators, Teresa Di Vita-Geremia and Pierre Chavez, and the many faculty chaperones who accompany our students. We are inspired in this work by the resilience of our Jesuit partners around the world, particularly in places that have struggled to contain the virus and provide adequate access to vaccinations. We join with all in solidarity and prayer, as we look forward to an end to this pandemic or to a day when despite its presence, we can resume all the activities that enrich our lives.
|
|
LOOKING BACK ON 2021 AS A GLOBAL COMMUNITY: SEEING ALL THINGS NEW IN CHRIST
|
The year 2021 was a year in which our contemporary way of proceeding in Jesuit education came to the fore. Working together in a global collaborative Ignatian way left us with new innovative learning experiences and practical resources to help us reach out to one another, and to continue to grow as a global community of Jesuit and Ignatian educators, together. |
|
Tag your social media posts with #jesuitschools and share your global journeys in & out of the classroom.
|
|
Programs, events and initiatives |
|
VIRTUAL EVENT: AN EXAMINATION OF ALTERNATIVE BREAK TRIPS AND WHITENESS IN CATHOLIC EDUCATION
|
PRESENTERS:
Susan Haarman - Associate Director, Service-Learning Program Manager Loyola University Chicago
Annie Selak - Women's Center, Associate Director Georgetown University
DATE:
Wednesday, January 19, 2022
3:00-4:15 PM EASTERN/12:00-1:15PM PACIFIC
Haarman and Selak will present on and lead a discussion on their recent publication, Alternative Break Trips and Whiteness in Jesuit Higher Education.
Abstract: Alternative break trips punctuate life on Jesuit college campuses, acting as experiences of conversion and putting faith into action. The Universal Apostolic Preferences of “walking with the excluded” and “accompanying the youth” come together in the practice of alternative break programs. However, these trips often operate through the position of whiteness. In this paper, we examine alternative service trips through the lens of whiteness. Too often, predominately white groups insert themselves into non-white contexts and assert themselves as owners of the space. Practices of white university students instrumentalizing experiences of service as agents in their own conversion displace the agency of others, resulting in a lack of solidarity and a shallow experience of walking with the excluded. While walking with the excluded is an important preference to enact, it must not be done in the posture of “inverted hospitality.” Accompanying the youth entails challenging structures of whiteness and privilege. We propose best practices for accompanying the youth through resisting cultures of whiteness and instead moving towards solidarity.
Can’t make the live call? Register anyway to receive the recording and resources.
|
|
This beautiful prayer is attributed to St. Brendan the Navigator (484-577 A.D.), also known as St. Brendan the Voyager, an ancient Irish monk, abbot, sailor, ship-builder and explorer. He is the patron saint of mariners, sailors, travelers and the U.S. Navy. His feast day is May 16th. It is believed by some historians that the holy abbot, eager to spread the Gospel to unknown lands, with the winds of the Holy Spirit in his sails, traveled by boat to North America—making him the very first explorer to set foot on her shores. Some say it was the legend of St. Brendan’s Voyage that prompted Christopher Columbus to launch his own attempt to discover the New World a thousand years later.
|
|
The Jesuit Schools Network promotes the educational ministry of the Society of Jesus in service to the Catholic Church by strengthening Jesuit schools for the mission of Jesus Christ. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
