In 1592 a soldier who loved women, gambling and swordplay was crippled by a canonball during battle. While he recovered he asked for romance novels to pass the time, but all that was available was a book of saints and the life of Jesus Christ. At that point the soldier had a religious conversion and decided that Jesus Christ was worth imitating. He then founded an order of priests that came to be called the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits. That soldier was Saint Ignatius Loyola.
Four hundred years later, during Jesuit Awareness Week Jesuit universities are faced with a single question: What does it mean to be Jesuit?
Many students categorize the Jesuit tradition as synonymous with Campus Ministry. One of the Jesuit’s mottos is “Men and women for others,” and while service work is important, it is not the summation of the Jesuit tradition.
The Jesuits are known for strong academics as well, especially with discovering the meaning and purpose of an individual’s rigorous education. We also see that aspect of the identity on campus, but it also is not the crux of the Jesuit identity.
The Jesuit tradition at Fairfield is not stressed to students, which might be why so few could identify what exactly it means. It is a rich tradition, however, and should not be an exclusive value that is mistakenly associated by the grand majority of students with only a few features on campus. At this point we can say that Fairfield’s academics and service programs are the things on campus that come closest to fulfilling the Jesuit identity, but it is not enough. We should be able to recognize the Jesuit identity through every aspect of Fairfield life.
Another Jesuit motto is that everything is “for the greater glory of God.” This does not mean that we have to spend four weeks in solitude prayer, or even be religious as Ignatius Loyola was in order to embrace the Jesuit tradtion. It does mean, however, that every person on campus should know that the tradition is accessible, and that it is our challenge to try and define for ourselves what the Jesuit tradition means and then to actualize it.
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