Editor’s note: Throughout July, we’re hosting 31 Days with St. Ignatius, a month-long celebration of Ignatian spirituality. In addition to the calendar of Ignatian articles found here, posts on dotMagis this month will explore the theme of “Hope Through the Twists and Turns.”
We were always an Ignatian family. My mother’s older brother had been a Jesuit for some years before she married my father, who was playing football at Loyola University in New Orleans. I was born while he was still running the ball. (He could outrun anybody.) My godmother knitted a sweater for me with a big “L” in maroon and gold.
That early Ignatian influence affected me. I was going to be a Jesuit from my first diapers. It wasn’t so simple, though, when I was a senior in 1947. World War II was over, and I was in the only high school that had an official Marine unit. Our senator was chair of the Armed Services Committee, and Marines were still doing policing work in various places around the globe.
My vocational decision came down to a simple choice. Did I join the Marines for a stint before going to the Jesuit novitiate, or not? There was that pull, and I wanted to get the decision nailed down. Should I risk not making it to the Jesuits by getting attached to Marine life? That was a real possibility.
What happened was a special grace. That year, the New Orleans novitiate had so many men coming in that it established an early entry date of July 2, and it turned out that I was the only one who took it. My reason was simple. If I didn’t get into the novitiate while my diploma was still damp, I wasn’t going to get into the novitiate. That was the twist.
The turn came on the porch at the end of the passenger train I rode up to the novitiate. I had exactly the number of this-and-that I was told to bring. I also had my cigarettes in my shirt pocket. Knowing I could not smoke in the novitiate, I stood on that little porch, smoked my last cigarette, and threw the rest of the pack off the tracks.
That was the last dramatic decision in my 65 years as a Jesuit. The rest has been deliberately undramatic.
Today in 31 Days with St. Ignatius, read Except That of Knowing That I Do Your Will by Melinda LeBlanc. Then share how you find hope through the twists and turns of life with the hashtag #31DayswithIgnatius on your favorite social media channels.
