At Fordham, students from all three campuses gathered to listen to, discuss, and commemorate the historic visit from the first Jesuit pope.

A live viewing at the Lincoln Center campus of the pope’s address to Congress

Papal flags flew and “Pope2Congress” bingo cards were distributed on Sept 24, as members of the Fordham community gathered around televisions on all three campuses to watch Pope Francis address a joint session of the U.S. Congress.

In addition to the lobby in the McGinley Center and Room 228 at the Westchester campus, the address—the first ever for a pope—was broadcast in the plaza-level lobby at the Lincoln Center campus.

The address, in which the pope challenged U.S. leaders on issues such immigration, global climate change, and income inequality, drew both a mix of curious onlookers who lingered at the top of the escalators upon seeing the crowd, and those who listened intently to the hour-long address.

Jamie Saltamachia, FCRH ‘14, GSS ’15, assistant director of the Dorothy Day Center for Service and Justice, was excited that the pope was speaking directly to leaders whose constituents, in many cases, are poor.

“He’s really made an impact on a lot of people and really opened a lot of eyes,” she said.

“People who may have lost their faith years ago are starting to come back to the church, because he is so open minded and has a strong sense of social justice.”

Katie Svejkoski, a first-year English graduate student from St. Louis, said she was pleasantly surprised that Francis called for the abolishment of the death penalty, and was thrilled that he praised Dorothy Day.

John J. Shea, S.J. director for Campus Ministry at Lincoln Center, said he found the pope to be very strong in what he wanted to say without being political. And while he was particularly impressed that Francis grouped Thomas Merton with Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., and Dorothy Day as Americans worthy of emulation, he said it was amazing just to see a pope in such a setting.

“We live in interesting times. A pope would never have been invited when I was a boy in high school, when John F. Kennedy was trying to get elected, because they thought the pope would try to run America,” he said.

“Today we see that 30 percent of Congress is Roman Catholic, including the speaker of the house, as are the vice president and more than half of the Supreme Court. It’s all amazing.”

Procession through Central Park

The pope’s second day in New York began with an address to the United Nations, followed by a solemn visit the 9/11 Memorial and Museum in downtown Manhattan. Later that afternoon, the pontiff spoke to elementary school students at Our Lady Queen of Angels School in Harlem before greeting the multitude in Central Park.

At Central Park, where 80,000 New Yorkers won tickets in a lottery to the papal procession, some members of the Fordham community waited in line for nearly three hours to get into the park, as several lines snaked between 60^th and 69^th streets.

Once in the park, Maddy Cunningham, DSW, professor of social work at the Graduate School of Social Service, made a decision to watch the procession rather than try to photograph the pope with her phone as he passed by in his Popemobile.

“I just wanted to see him with my own eyes, to experience the moment,” said Cunningham, who still remembers seeing Pope Paul VI in a procession on Queens Boulevard as a child in 1965. “I am glad I didn’t even try to film [because]he was turned to our side, and he was waving. I now have that image in my mind’s eye.”

Noreen Rafferty, an assistant director in the office of marketing and communications, videotaped the moment when “all the hands went up.”

“It was unbelievable,” she said. “There were so many nationalities—Italian, Irish, Filipino, Puerto Rican. He’s got to come again.”

The Papal Mass at Madison Square Garden

From Central Park, Pope Francis journeyed south to Madison Square Garden, where he celebrated Mass Friday evening with more than 20,000 people.

Despite a three-hour wait and a line that stretched 20 city blocks, the atmosphere outside the arena was one of excitement and conviviality. Strangers befriended one another as they inched closer to the entrance. A group of nuns sang hymns to pass the time. One man broke from the line and ducked into a Duane Reade, returning with a case of water for the wearying pilgrims.

“I was thirsty, and I figured everyone else was, too,” he said as he distributed water bottles down the line.

At 6 p.m. sharp, musicians from St. Patrick’s Cathedral Choir and the New York Archdiocesan Festival Chorale began the processional hymn, and Pope Francis processed into the arena accompanied by bishops, priests, deacons, and seminarians from throughout New York State.

The 90-minute Mass was as international as the crowd itself, with the liturgy alternating between Spanish and English and prayers being offered in Gaelic, Mandarin, French, and Italian. In his homily, Pope Francis spoke in Spanish about the role of faith in cities. Big cities encompass the diversity of life, with their many cultures, languages, cuisines, traditions, and histories. Negotiating this diversity is not always easy, though, the pontiff said. Tragically, our most vibrant cities tend to hide “second-class citizens.”

“Beneath the roar of traffic, beneath the ‘rapid pace of change,’ so many faces pass by unnoticed because they have no ‘right’ to be there, no right to be part of the city,” Pope Francis said from an ambo built especially for the Mass by young men from Lincoln Hall Boys’ Haven.

“They are the foreigners, the children who go without schooling, those deprived of medical insurance, the homeless, the forgotten elderly. These people stand at the edges of our great avenues, in our streets, in deafening anonymity. They become part of an urban landscape which is more and more taken for granted, in our eyes, and especially in our hearts.”

The remedy to our “isolation and lack of concern for the lives of others” is faith, the pope said. We must heed the words of the prophet Isaiah by “learning to see” God within the city, and then go out to meet others “where they really are, not where we think they should be.”

“The people who walk, breath, and live in the midst of smog, have seen a great light, have experienced a breath of fresh air,” Pope Francis said. This light imbues us with a “liberating” hope—“A hope which is unafraid of involvement… which makes us see, even in the midst of smog, the presence of God as he continues to walk the streets of our city.”

As the Mass drew to a close, Archbishop of New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan offered words of welcome and gratitude to the Holy Father on behalf of New Yorkers.

“Every day and at every Mass, we pray for Francis our pope—and now you here you are!” Cardinal Dolan said, prompting an eruption of cheering and applause throughout the arena—the single display of ebullience amid an otherwise reverent liturgy.

“It is so dazzlingly evident this evening that the Church is our family. Thank you, Holy Father, for visiting us, your family.”

The pope offered a final blessing and before departing, delivered his familiar farewell.

“And please, I ask you—don’t forget to pray for me,” he said.

Fordham Day of Service

On Sept. 26, students and other members of the Fordham community participated in a day of service with Habitat for Humanity-Westchester in honor of the pope’s visit, said Carol Gibney, assistant director of campus ministry. More students showed up than had signed up, she said.

The students worked on refurbishing the Pope Francis house in Yonkers as well as on some other projects in the surrounding area—cleaning an abandoned lot, planting flowers, and laying a brick walkway.

“The area we worked in is one of those communities that are often plagued with violence, crime, and poverty,” said Gibney. “It is one of those communities often forgotten or discarded as ‘worthless’” that Pope Francis spoke about on his U.S. trip.

Once the South Yonkers house is completed in December, it will become the home of U.S. Army Sgt. Michael Velazquez, 24, and his family of six.

“It was a great day for our students as the idea of being men and women for others, particularly by helping to build a house for an Iraqi veteran, a house that is named after the first Jesuit Pope!”

(Patrick Verel and Janet Sassi contributed to this report. Various photographs were submitted by members of the Fordham community.)

[doptg id=”34″] ]]> 28546 https://now.fordham.edu/living-the-mission/its-not-every-millennium-that-a-jesuit-becomes-a-pope/ Fri, 15 Mar 2013 19:44:21 +0000 http://news.fordham.sitecare.pro/?p=30055

“Shocked.” “An Ingenious Choice.” “ What would St. Ignatius think?”

Members of Fordham’s Jesuit community were stunned, along with their Jesuit brethren around the globe, when one from their own order upended a long Catholic tradition to become the first Jesuit pope in the church’s history on March 13.

“The thing I find interesting is that he took the name Francis, most likely after Francis of Assisi,” said John J. Shea, S.J., director of campus ministry at the Lincoln Center campus. “He has lived a poor life, like Francis did, giving up his wealth. But moreover, Francis had a vision from Christ on the cross saying to him, ‘Rebuild my church.’ With so many problems now, that may be part of [Pope Francis’] mandate—to be like Francis of Assisi to ‘rebuild my church.’”

R. Bentley Anderson, S.J. associate professor of African and African American studies, said that Pope Francis would bring “an understanding of Ignatian discernment” which will serve him well in his new role.

Mark S. Mossa, S.J., a lecturer in theology, admitted that, as a Jesuit, he felt just a bit conflicted at coming to terms with the gap between the humility of St. Ignatius and the pomp normally associated with the pontiff.

“As a Jesuit, you have this spirituality in common with all the other Jesuits around the world, so when one of our Jesuits does something great and wonderful, we share in that,” he said. “[But] part of our charism, and the founding of the Society of Jesus, was St. Ignatius’ determination that Jesuits not be like other clerics, who he saw as sort of vying for positions of power and ambition for higher office.”

And yet, in his first appearance, Pope Francis made it clear that he bears much humility by eschewing formal accoutrements in favor of a simple white cassock and asking for his followers’ blessing, said Father Mossa.

Leaving the Conclave, there was a much-publicized moment when the new pope boarded the bus with other cardinals rather than opt to take a private car waiting for him.

“We [Jesuits] are used to a common life of community. We’re more accustomed to sharing,” said Joseph Lienhard, S.J., professor of theology. “Nobody here at Rose Hill owns a car, the community has some cars that we simply sign up to use.”

Even in describing the moment the new pope stepped out onto the Vatican balcony, Father Lienhard referred to it as a moment experienced communally.

“I haven’t had time to process this personally,” he said. “After more than 50 years as a member of this order you think in terms of ‘us’ and ‘we.’”

And in true spiritual communion, said Father Mossa, Pope Francis inspired the masses in St. Peter’s Square to pray in silence—one of the Jesuits’ spiritual exercises.

“Silence is so important to our Jesuit tradition,” said Father Mossa. “[With] the Internet, the social media, it seems like there’s lots of noise out here. I think if [the pope]can bring a sense that the world needs silence too, that would be a wonderful contribution.”

“I said jokingly that this would be a perfect office if I were coming in to open a bank account,” said Father Shea, Fordham Lincoln Center’s new director of campus ministry and chaplain.

So the L-shaped desk and small wooden conference table have been replaced with a couch and two plush chairs. Eastern statues have joined Western theology texts along the bookshelves, and mementos of Father Shea’s time in Asia are displayed on the coffee table.

“This is where students can come in, feel relaxed, talk,” he said.

Father Shea is no stranger to Fordham. Besides earning a bachelor’s degree from Fordham in 1969, he taught in the psychology department, worked as a psychologist in the counseling center, and was rector of Murray-Weigel Hall from 1986 to 1989. From 1989 until 1996, he was associate vice president and then vice president for student affairs.

“There are so many familiar faces that it’s kind of a homecoming in many ways,” he said. “People have been very welcoming on both campuses.”

After leaving Fordham in 1996, Father Shea continued in higher education administration, becoming president of John Carroll University. In 1999, he moved to the University of Scranton (which at that time was under the leadership of Fordham President Joseph M. McShane, S.J.) and advanced to vice president for mission and ministry.

The last seven years, however, have found him in an entirely different setting. Since 2005 Father Shea has been the director of the East Asia Theological Encounter Program in Chiangmai, Thailand—a post he will continue to hold remotely. There, he instructed Jesuit scholastics on Eastern theology, taught English to Thai students (he speaks Thai fluently), and worked at a retreat house in Chiangmai.

“I’d wanted adventure, change,” he said of his experience in Asia. “I’d been in higher education for 26 years and just felt that I wanted to do something different. When this opportunity arose, I jumped at it.”

At the top of the Father Shea’s list these days is to make sure that all Lincoln Center students, undergraduate and graduate alike, know what campus ministry has to offer.

“Campus ministry has been associated more with undergraduates, but my intention is to visit with the deans of the graduate schools and let them know, too, that this office is available.”

Another goal is to create a weekly meditation group, offering students a way to decrease stress while learning about a lesser-known practice of Christianity.

“There’s a whole tradition of Christian meditation,” he said. “It’s very much like Zen or Buddhist meditation. You sit quietly and don’t think, and if thoughts come, then you simply bring yourself back to focusing on breathing rather than going where your mind takes you. Over the years, you become much more at peace, and much more aware.”

Although Father Shea’s return to Fordham is, for him, a homecoming, the world traveler says that he is also looking forward to seeing the University from a new perspective at Lincoln Center.

“I love Fordham,” Father Shea said. “And I’m excited about being here at Lincoln Center. It’s a new thing, and a challenge.”

Both an alumnus and a former Fordham administrator, Father Shea’s decade-long tenure at the University included numerous positions, including staff psychologist, rector of the Jesuit community in Murray-Weigel Hall, and associate and acting vice president for student affairs—a post he held from 1986 to 1990.

From 1991 until 1996, Father Shea served as vice president for student affairs.

“By virtue of his broad experience, Father Shea is well suited to serve the pastoral and spiritual needs of the undergraduate and graduate students at Fordham, a community he knows and loves so well, as well as those of faculty and staff, and we are certain that he will continue to build on the good work already in place here,” said Monsignor Joseph G. Quinn, vice president for University mission and ministry.

From 1996 to 1998, Father Shea served as president of John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. Under his watch, the university grew its endowment from $73 million to $106 million, increased admissions by 10 percent, and oversaw the revitalization of several academic programs.

Father Shea rejoins campus ministry after having served as vice president for mission and ministry at the University of Scranton from 2002 to 2005. Prior to that, he was Scranton’s assistant vice president for advancement, and an associate professor of counseling and human resources.

Most recently, Father Shea was director of the East Asia Theological Encounter Program in Chiangmai, Thailand, and assistant vice president for international exchange at Sophia University in Tokyo, Japan.

Father Shea received his bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Fordham, master’s degrees in counseling psychology and divinity from Boston College and Woodstock Jesuit College, respectively, and his doctorate in counseling and clinical psychology from Catholic University.