Jesuit Terms

A phrase that embodies the creative tension between Jesuits’ full embrace of concrete action and their attentiveness to where God may call them next. In The Active Life, Parker Palmer writes, “Contemplation-and-action are integrated at the root, and their root is our ceaseless desire to be fully alive.”

Defined by the Catechism of the Catholic Church as “a radical reorientation of the whole life away from sin and evil, and toward God.” Bernard Lonergran, SJ,writes, “It is not the substitution of a new self-image, no matter how upright, for an old one. It reaches down into the roots of an individual’s affections, images, dreams, and choices….

This fundamental value of the Society of Jesus involves three concepts, according to Brian McDermott, SJ: Treating people as individuals and honoring their unique worth; caring for the “whole” person (including physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual health); and taking into account people’s backgrounds, including their family life, nationality, and culture.