Home and abroad
British Jesuits work both in Britain but also in many countries around the world. It is part of our vocation to be available to go where the need is greatest, and that for some means leaving home and serving in some challenging and unusual situations.
Here Jesuits speak of their lives, of what they are doing and how they see what they are doing as fitting in with their Jesuit vocation. Please click on the name or photo to read the full article.
Dr. Paul O’Reilly SJ
"Don't give up the day job," said the Provincial at my ordination. So, during the day, I work as a GP for homeless people in Westminster. This is an open access drop-in medical service for homeless people in London. It was started about 20 years ago by Dr Mary Hickey, a sister of the 'Daughters of Mary and Joseph' on her return from a mission doing gynaecology in Africa.
Norman Tanner SJ
Presently I am professor of Church History at the Gregorian University in Rome. There are some 3,000 students from all round the world, most of them studying for the priesthood or recently ordained and doing further studies. I have several of the main compulsory courses to teach, so I meet a large proportion of the students. It is an exceptionally interesting and, I hope, fruitful apostalate. While lecturing is my principal duty, more than half my time is spent writing books and articles. Writing is laborious and hidden work, yet with the wide diffusion of the English language the potential readers are many.
Christopher Corbally, SJ
Since 1984 I have been working mainly in Tucson, Arizona, where the Vatican Observatory has a research group in addition to its headquarters at Castel Gandolfo, near Rome. What I am doing is in a fine tradition of British Jesuits being involved in astronomy. These include Father Perry, who was at Stonyhurst College in the latter half of the nineteenth century and was famous for his transit of Venus and eclipse expeditions. Another was Father Sidgreaves, who succeeded Father Perry as director of the Stonyhurst Observatory and made pioneering observations of stellar spectra, much in the tradition of the prodigious Italian Jesuit, Father Secchi, a little earlier at the Roman College
Frank Turner SJ
I work in Brussels, as general director of the Jesuit European Office, also known as OCIPE (the acronym of a fifty year-old description in French!). OCIPE is an international organisation with offices also in Budapest and Warsaw, and a presence in Strasbourg. At the European Union and the Council of Europe we sustain critical reflection on European politics from a Christian perspective; promote Europe’s solidarity internally and with the developing world; and support EU officials in their professional and spiritual discernment. We follow constitutional questions, such as the Treaty of Lisbon, and policy questions, such as the EU’s enlargement. In Brussels, we also work as a social centre, representing at the EU Jesuit social centres elsewhere, especially in Africa and Latin America
