It turned out to be a charismatic
meeting, and when we got there, I expe-
rienced the conflicting interior experi-
ences that are a sign of spiritual warfare.
As I watched people raise their hands
and say things like “Praise the Lord,”
the thought came, “This is weird stuff.”
Yet I also found myself attracted to the
vibrant, deep, joyful relationship with
the Lord that these folks obviously had.
The words of the songs seemed direct-
ed to me personally, and when people
started to speak and then sing to the
Lord in tongues, though I didn’t under-
stand, I found it very beautiful. In fact,
I felt my whole spirit lift up, as though
I was floating on their voices. I had al-
ways thought of God as “out there,”
but that night, He seemed very close. It
was then that I remembered that I had
prayed that heartfelt prayer the night be-
fore. It was an amazing experience, for I
simply couldn’t deny that the Lord had
answered my prayer in an obvious and
dramatic way.
Of course, at the time, I thought it was
going to be a package deal and that I’d
get the girl, too, but He had other ideas! Obviously, philosophy and theology are
subjects you greatly enjoy, while the
average person might think of that stuff
as “just for the academics.” How do
philosophy and theology touch people
on an everyday basis?
What drew you to religious life, and
specifically to the Jesuits in 1977? Would it be fair to say that’s the driving
force behind your ministry?
I went to Loyola College in Baltimore,
and I also worked at Georgetown Prep
High School in the D.C. area as a resi-
dence hall prefect, so that gave me con-
nections with the Jesuits. My father, in
fact, had been in the Jesuits for a while.
He was never ordained, and he made the
very wise discernment to leave. Of course,
I have a vested interest in that!
Jesuits are involved in many different
apostolic fields—retreat work, education,
the missions, parishes, and so forth—and
that attracted me. After I entered, I came
to appreciate the spiritual exercises of St.
Ignatius, the centrality of discernment,
and the meaning of the motto, Ad maio-
rem Dei gloriam, “All things for the greater
glory of God.” This approach to life en-
ables us to become all we can be, and de-
spite my many stumbles, I try to do that
and help others do the same. I’d say so. Pastoral ministry is all about
helping Jesus save souls. He wants us to
be happy with him forever in the kingdom
he’s preparing, but we can’t take salvation
for granted. He calls each of us to cooper-
ate, which includes the call to evangelize—
the call, as Archbishop Vigneron’s pasto-
ral letter puts it, to “unleash the Gospel.”
According to St. Anselm, theology is
“faith seeking understanding.” So, if some-
one has faith and really believes that Jesus
is Lord—believes that God became man and
took on flesh in the womb of the Virgin
Mary; believes that Jesus taught us and con-
firmed his teaching through his compas-
sion and miracles, especially his Passion,
Death, and Resurrection; believes that he
established a Church and offers his Holy
Spirit so that we can live with a view to shar-
ing his resurrection life forever in his com-
pleted kingdom—if someone really believes
all of that, then it seems to me he ought to
try to understand it as best he can.
Theologians do sometimes speculate
on matters that seem irrelevant to people,
but when they realize that theology is in
fact concerned with crucially important
questions such as “What’s going to hap-
pen to me when I die?” they become very
interested.
Before coming to Detroit, you taught at
Mount St. Mary’s Seminary and several
other places and served for a time as
executive director of the U.S. Bishops’
Secretariat of Doctrine and Canonical
Affairs. What did you do in that role?
I helped provide staff support for the
U.S. Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine,
chaired by Archbishop Vigneron. The com-
mittee deals with various issues regarding
faith and morals that come before them.
For example, helping immigrants involves
cooperating with the government in cer-
tain ways, and sometimes the government
requires things that are morally question-
able. I analyzed various issues and offered
theological advice to help the committee
judge whether the cooperation in question
was compatible with moral norms and an
authentic proclamation of the Gospel.
How did you end up at Sacred Heart?
After my service to the bishops’
confer ence ended in 2016, Archbishop
Vigneron invited me.
I had always respected Sacred Heart be-
cause I was aware of the remarkable facul-
ty here. We have a collection of very fine
scholars, and it’s an entirely faithful place.
I was also pleased to be with sound, theo-
logically sophisticated people who share my
background in the Charismatic Renewal.
They and other faculty members are ready
and willing to proclaim the Gospel and pro-
mote the mission of the seminary.
In addition to teaching, you also serve
as spiritual director of undergraduate
seminarians. What advice do you give
them about their discernment?
Helping with the spiritual formation of
our college seminarians is a very impor-
tant part of my job. One aspect of that
work is helping them recognize how God
is communicating with them. As a Je-
suit, I’m naturally interested in Ignatian
spirituality, and I have found St. Ignatius’
rules for the discernment of spirits partic-
ularly helpful in equipping these young
men to recognize when a thought or idea
is from the Lord or from someone else.
I also try to help them learn from the
mistakes I made when I was a Jesuit nov-
ice. I had the idea that I needed to know
from day one whether I was going to be a
priest, and that assumption caused me a
great deal of anxiety. But now I’m able to
tell the men, “If you sincerely sought to
do God’s will in entering, you can be con-
fident that you are where He wants you
to be. And if you give yourself wholeheart-
edly to the program of formation, God
will make it clear to you at his chosen time
whether he is calling you to be priest.”
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