Mikhael Ahmad from the British Province and Eamonn Walls from the Irish Province professed their Vows to God in the Blessed Sacrament, held by their respective provincials, Damian Howard SJ and Leonard Moloney SJ. This is how St Ignatius and his First Companions professed their vows together in Montmartre, Paris, on the 15th August 1534, and that tradition has continued to the present day.
Fr Simon Bishop SJ, the Novice Master, remarked:
"I wonder what Ignatius is thinking and feeling as he sees these two young men follow his example and those of so many Jesuits who give themselves entirely in the service of the Lord and the Church nearly 500 years later! It is such a beautiful and simple act of love. If you blinked you might miss it! But there, in front of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we offer ourselves completely to God, thanking Him for his love and grace and asking him to continue to give us His love and His grace so that we, in turn, can love and serve Him and his people, especially those most in need, for the rest of our lives. The First Vows echo a beautiful prayer of the previous Superior General of the Society of Jesus, Fr Adolfo Nicolás SJ..."
Lord Jesus,
What weaknesses did you see in us that made you decide to call us, in spite of everything, to collaborate in your mission?
We give you thanks for having called us, and we beg you not to forget your promise to be with us to the end of time.
Frequently we are invaded by the feeling of having worked all night in vain, forgetting, perhaps, that you are with us. We ask that you make yourself present in our lives and in our work, today, tomorrow, and in the future yet to come.
Fill with your love these lives of ours, which we put at your service. Take from our hearts the egoism of thinking about what is “ours,” what is “mine”, always excluding, lacking compassion and joy.
Enlighten our minds and our hearts, and do not forget to make us smile when things do not go as we wished.
At the end of the day, of each one of our days, make us feel more united with you and better able to perceive and discover around us greater joy and greater hope. We ask all this from our reality. We are weak and sinful men, but we are your friends.
Amen.
Let us pray for Mikhael and Eamonn as they begin their next steps of Jesuit life.
