Category: Spiritual Life

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Jesuit Studying Master’s in Emergency and Disaster Management Reflects on Mission of Solidarity

In this week’s post, we hear from Fr. Taroh Amédé, S.J., a development officer for American Jesuits International, as well as a student in the SCS Master’s in Emergency and Disaster Management program. He reflects on the global mission of the Jesuits and how he is working to realize that mission through his work and study. 

Last week, we reflected on the enduring significance of St. Ignatius of Loyola on the occasion of his feast day. This week, we feature a living embodiment of the Ignatian charism by introducing Fr. Taroh Amédé, S.J., a development officer for American Jesuits International, an international organization that helps build just and equitable societies by mobilizing support for Jesuit education and development initiatives that serve marginalized communities in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. In addition to his professional role, Fr. Taroh is currently studying in the Master’s in Emergency and Disaster Management program (EDM) at the School of Continuing Studies and living in the Jesuit residential community at Gonzaga College High School. This academic year, he will contribute to religious life on Georgetown’s Capitol Campus by occasionally presiding at the Sunday, 5 p.m. Capitol Campus Catholic Mass at Holy Rosary Church. 

Since its inception, the Jesuits, also known as the Society of Jesus, have been a global religious community with various works situated throughout the world. What binds this universal project together is a shared mission to work for the greater glory of God, or AMDG, one of Georgetown’s ten Spirit of Georgetown values. This blog has previously covered how this global religious order regularly reviews, reflects, and chooses how best to serve its universal mission in light of changing “signs of the times.” The most recent affirmation of Jesuit priorities, the four Universal Apostolic Preferences, reflect how all Jesuit works, including schools, should be responding to the world’s greatest needs in this moment. These preferences include showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the poor, the outcasts of the world, those whose dignity has been violated, in a mission of reconciliation and justice; journeying with young people in the creation of a hope-filled future; and collaborating, with Gospel depth, for the protection and renewal of God’s creation. 

In this reflection posted on the American Jesuits International website, Fr. Taroh invites us to “Learn from Ignatius of Loyola, Work for the Great Glory of God.” I invite you to read his reflection in its entirety. In particular, I wanted to point out a particular image that Fr. Taroh uses, the bridge, that resonates deeply with Georgetown’s own global mission of generous service for justice and the common good. He writes: 

“Ignatius understood this centuries earlier. The Jesuits, together with our lay collaborators, know of the transformative power of education. We continue to walk with the poor, ensuring that even those who struggle to afford a meal or pay school fees are not forgotten. We know that providing an education means we are opening the opportunity for a brighter future. 

As a Jesuit from Chad working as the Development Officer for American Jesuits International, I am blessed to be a bridge between those in need and those with the means to help them. I am deeply moved each day by the struggles of people in Latin America, Africa, and Asia who lack access to basic education and are often marginalized. At the same time, I am inspired to see the impact of our global mission and grateful to each person who helps us attend to those in need.”

Inspired by Fr. Taroh’s reference to the Ignatian tradition of education for the common good, I wanted to learn more about how his own education at Georgetown has shaped his worldview and preparation for mission. I asked Fr. Taroh the following question: “How has your education at Georgetown’s School of Continuing Studies informed your vocation as a Jesuit? How will your Georgetown education help you better serve the mission of the Jesuits?” Here is his response: 

At Georgetown’s School of Continuing Studies, I am studying Emergency and Disaster Management. Whenever I introduce myself and mention this field of study, people are often curious, how does being a Jesuit priest connect with training in emergency management?

The mission of an Emergency and Disaster Manager is to protect communities by coordinating and integrating all necessary activities to build, sustain, and improve the capacity to mitigate, prepare for, respond to, and recover from natural disasters, acts of terrorism, or other man-made crises. The mission of the Society of Jesus is one of justice and reconciliation, helping people to be reconciled with God, with themselves, with one another, and with creation.

What unites these two missions is a shared commitment to the protection and dignity of human life. Both seek to prevent harm and alleviate suffering. I am studying EDM not in addition to being a Jesuit, but to become a better Jesuit. My education at Georgetown is deepening and expanding my vocation in meaningful ways.

Through EDM, I see more clearly how the Jesuit call to be “men and women for others” intersects with the urgent challenges facing our world, especially those affecting vulnerable communities before, during, and after crises. These studies are strengthening my compassion, sharpening my skills, and confirming me more and more in my vocation.

When I reflect on how my Georgetown education will help me serve the Jesuit mission, I see it from two perspectives, present and future.

Currently, I work with American Jesuits International (AJI), an organization that supports Jesuit education and development projects across Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Through this work, I see, hear, and encounter the suffering of people living on the margins. My education in EDM gives me a better understanding of the systemic challenges they face, and prepares me to respond more effectively and with greater empathy.

Looking ahead, I hope to continue using the knowledge I gain through the Emergency and Disaster Management program to serve God’s people and help build a world that reflects the justice, compassion, and hope God desires for all creation.

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Reading Georgetown’s Mission Statement Slowly and Spiritually

With over five years of posts, this Mission in Motion blog now observes some annual traditions. This week, I would like to revisit two traditions: spiritual practices especially suitable for the summer months (see “This Summer: Learn to Pray, Read Slowly and Spiritually, and/or Explore Nature”) and learning more about the deeply mission-aligned Summer College Immersion Program (see “Vocation, Discernment, and Decision-Making with the Summer College Immersion Program”). The occasion for discussing both things is my experience this week of providing an introduction to reflection in the Jesuit Tradition to the students in the Summer College Immersion Program (SCIP). This three-week college prep program for rising high school seniors from the Cristo Rey Network, the KIPP Foundation school systems, as well as other select schools, networks, and community-based organizations helps prepare high-achieving students for the college admissions process. 

My introduction to reflection in the Jesuit tradition included an Examen meditation about the students’ initial experiences of SCIP and their encounters in the first week of the program with the Georgetown campus. By modeling this core reflective practice, I sought to introduce these rising seniors to a contemplative tradition that serves as a needed antidote to the distractions and preoccupations of our heavily technologically-dominated digital age. It is my common experience that sharing the Examen with large groups, especially with persons who have never engaged with the practice, can cause participants to realize just how much need they have in their lives for more quiet and concentrated attention. This week’s experience of the Examen with the SCIP students was no different. 

The session also involved a bit of teaching about the identity and mission of Georgetown as a university founded in the Jesuit tradition. At the very least, my goal in an engagement like this is to make students aware of Georgetown’s Catholic and Jesuit identity, mission, and heritage. I always relish when students appreciate that the University’s enactment of its core values includes an abiding commitment to religious diversity and hospitality of differing views, identities, and life experiences. I use Georgetown’s mission statement as the point of departure for growing awareness about this characteristic of the University’s commitment to pluralism and dialogue across differences. And like the Examen, this exercise of introducing the mission becomes an embodied spiritual practice: Lectio Divina (or the tradition of sacred reading). 

The students took turns reading each paragraph of the mission slowly and intentionally. I then asked the group to let the statement’s words and phrases simmer. What stands out to you? What captures your attention? What energizes you? What confuses or distracts you? Without realizing it, the students were using all of their sensory experience, not just their cognitive processing, to engage with this exercise. The result? Students shared insightful responses to particular ideas in the mission statement and how these concepts related back to their actual experience of Georgetown and their time in SCIP. In this way, the students were beginning to appropriate the mission in their own lives. And hopefully students leaving this program with an intention to apply to Jesuit colleges and universities will have more vocabulary and more understanding about the mission and values of institutions in the network.

Sacred Reading is a powerful practice because it can illuminate the deeper meaning and personal resonance of individual words and phrases. Even something we regularly read, like the University’s mission statement, can present new transformative insights when we give the words our disciplined attention.  

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An Examen for Summer

This week’s post is a reflection on the summer and how it might shape and inform our lenses of wonder and awe. 

The Summer Day 

Who made the world?

Who made the swan, and the black bear?

Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean—

the one who has flung herself out of the grass,

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—

who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,

which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?

Tell me, what is it you plan to do

with your one wild and precious life?

—Mary Oliver

In her poem, “The Summer Day,” Mary Oliver, beloved by many Jesuit-animated spiritual guides, gives the world an invitation to savor the scenes of summertime. Oliver asks us to look more closely at the creatures composing the scenes of our views and vistas. And then she recognizes that while she does not “know what exactly a prayer is,” she does know “how to pay attention.” In this way, the poet gives instructions for how to engage with an Examen by paying deeper attention to all the daily flora and fauna we encounter through our sensory experience. This kind of embodied knowing is beyond mechanical processes or conceptual knowledge. In this exercise of attention-paying, the Examen can shape choices in a spirit of abundant gratitude for our “one wild and precious life.” Oliver wants us to fully embrace the possibilities and potentialities of a life more fully lived. She wants us to be most fully alive by delighting in all that surrounds us. 

With the possibility of a more abundant, fully realized life as our backdrop, I would like to recommend that summer is a welcomed season for this kind of paying attention. I invite members of the Georgetown community to engage in the intentional pause of an Examen and, true to the Spirit of Georgetown, live the value of “Contemplation in Action.” This means that, like Oliver’s poem, we can find prayer in the midst of our awe and wonder at the scenes of daily life. Our paying attention becomes a form of spiritual practice, a prayerful way of being. How to do this, you might be asking? Especially how to do this, you might also be wondering, when awe and wonder do not accurately capture our present moods but instead belie a climate of challenge, difficulty, and anxious uncertainty? 

The Ignatian spiritual tradition suggests that we need to balance two kinds of imaginative lenses as we navigate the journey of life. On the one hand, it is necessary to employ a lens of wonder, which sees the beauty and majesty of people and the natural creation. A disposition of noticing the world through this view means savoring the goodness of humanity and the utter grandeur of the natural world. Try this lens out, especially during times of rest and relaxation this summer, and just give yourself over to what happens when you sit with the deep gladness that can arise in paying concentrated attention to everything you encounter. 

On the other hand, we also have to also use a lens of critique or skepticism as there is injustice and suffering and depravation in this world. This imagination requires a moral response, some kind of externalization of a better choice to be made, a more loving or healing decision, in light of the despair that we notice in our daily scenes and become aware of through our reading, learning, and social analysis. These realities can animate our conscience and give rise to actions for justice and the common good. 

I encourage you to use both views as you journey these days. Before long, the bells will toll for the fall semester and a new season will be upon all of us. For now, let us find some measure of rest in these long days. 

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Symbols of Light and Unity Carry the 2025 SCS Commencement

The 2025 SCS Commencement featured a stirring address by Steve Pemberton. He encouraged the Class to become Lighthouses for the world. You can watch Commencement on Facebook. 

Every Commencement Week reflects something unique about the particular moment in the world in which the graduates of the School of Continuing Studies are entering. A meaningful experience of the ceremonies of Commencement, both the Tropaia Awards in Gaston Hall for outstanding students, faculty, and staff as well as the actual Commencement Exercises that take place on Healy Lawn, included periods of prolonged reflection. In each ceremony, speakers attempt to signify the deeper meaning and purpose behind these formal gatherings. The effort is to ensure that the graduation experience does not float by without serious intentionality about what it means for everyone involved. 

This year, SCS was blessed to receive consoling messages that seemed to coalesce around a shared theme of light and unity in uncertain times. I was particularly struck by two images that were presented to the assembled along these lines. On Tuesday evening, Rabbi Rachel Gartner, Senior Advisor for Spiritual Care at SCS, gave the invocation prayer at Tropaia. Rabbi Rachel movingly invited all of us to come together in spite of our differences. The way through turbulence, Rabbi reflected, is by coming together as if we are all journeying in the same ship. While we cannot control the state of the waters around us, we can decide to find ways to unify in our shared purpose at Georgetown, motivated by our rich spiritual traditions and the commitments that arise from our mission and values. 

At Commencement, Steve Pemberton delivered a remarkably memorable address to the graduating class. An accomplished professional with diverse leadership experience across several sectors, Mr. Pemberton’s theme centered around the image of the Lighthouse. Arising from his own early life history of surviving traumas at the hands of a foster care system that failed to care for him, Mr. Pemberton reflected on the qualities of kindness, generosity, and magnanimity needed to weather life’s storms. How you share your gifts and talents with others, especially those most in need of them, is what defines a life. Mr. Pemberton, drawing on the wisdom of St. Ignatius that we should spend our lives in generous service with and for others by illuminating the world (in fact, setting it on fire), challenged the Class of 2025 to be light for the world. 

Rabbi Rachel Gartner blessed the 2025 SCS Tropaia awards by inviting the assembled to join together in a ship of togetherness to navigate turbulent waters. You can watch Tropaia here. 

This year’s Commencement reveals clearly that educational institutions, especially ones like Georgetown anchored in long traditions of religious heritage and values, need moments of communal gathering to reflect and celebrate together. The motto of the University, “Unum utraque,” or “both into one,” tells us that we are always stronger together. Congratulations, Class of 2025! 

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Mourning the Death of Pope Francis on the Capitol Campus

This week’s post reflects on the passing of Pope Francis and how services held on the Capitol Campus helped the university community grieve this transformative global leader. 

The world grieved this week for Pope Francis. Tears of sadness flowed not only from Catholics but from diverse communities of goodwill across the globe. There was something transcendent about the broad and cross-cutting appeal of Pope Francis, a leader that the world needed at this period in time. We seek to live in hope that his legacy of leadership, service, and moral example will endure. Georgetown was particularly impacted by the life of Pope Francis, which the university memorialized in this webpage detailing the myriad ways that Georgetown has been inspired by his moral and spiritual leadership.

This week, in addition to services occurring on the Hilltop Campus, multiple events taking place on Capitol Campus honored Pope Francis and assisted our downtown community in grieving. Taize Prayer, which is an ecumenical style of meditative worship through song, took place on Tuesday evening in the St. Thomas More Chapel in McDonough Hall of the Georgetown University Law Center. A portion of that prayer was reserved for reflecting on the life of Pope Francis and hearing aloud a portion of his last public address. On Wednesday morning, Catholic Mass in the St. Thomas More Chapel continued honoring Pope Francis by dedicating that service to him. Special petitions and a homily about how Pope Francis brought the Gospel to life in his devotion to lifting up the most marginalized and vulnerable people, particularly migrants and refugees, focused the community’s attention on how living up to his example means standing up for these communities today. 

As an urban planner trained in Ignatian spirituality and devoted to the mission of Jesuit education, I think one of the most underappreciated legacies of Pope Francis is his commitment to sustainable urban development. Pope Francis was an insightful urbanist, which is evidenced by his writing in “Laudato Si,’” a formative teaching document about the environmental crisis created by human-induced climate change (see especially paragraphs 147-155). Pope Francis understood the major challenges facing cities around the world because he experienced them from the perspective of the poor and the people most negatively impacted by inadequate urban systems like housing, transportation, and public space. He literally rode the buses of Buenos Aires as its archbishop. As a result of his bottom-up, lived experience, Pope Francis assessed the wellness of urban communities on the basis of how they advanced justice, sustainability, and equity for those most overlooked by those in power. The most recent SCS Dean’s Report explored how the School has answered this particular call of Pope Francis in supporting sustainable urban development. 

A special mass was held on the Capitol Campus for Pope Francis. One of his many enduring legacies will be his powerful teachings about sustainable urban development. 

I hope this time of transition in the leadership of the Catholic Church provides opportunities to remember the indelible marks that Pope Francis has left on the world. May our university community discern well how we want to put into practice all that we have learned from his earthly example. 

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Daily Digital Meditation Celebrates Five Years, Renews Invitation to Participate: Sign Up Today!

This week’s post is a promotion of the Digital Meditation hosted by SCS and available to all at Georgetown. You can sign up here to join! 

Readers of the Mission in Motion blog are likely familiar with an annual post that reflects on the significance of the Daily Digital Meditation (sign up here!). This daily offering, which occurs Monday through Friday at 12:00 p.m. ET and lasts for about 15 minutes, has been a mainstay of SCS Mission and Ministry programming, attracting more than 400 participants since first announced at the beginning of the global pandemic in March 2020. Every now and again, it is important to remind the SCS and now Capitol Campus community of this digital spiritual resource and encourage participation in this life-changing daily practice. 

Several prior blog reflections help put the value of the practice into context. Please consider reading: 

At its core, this virtual space is intended to give participants a needed reflective pause in the midst of busy lives of work and study. And while the value of in-person engagement remains essential, digital meditation facilitates spiritual opportunities for those in the Georgetown community who are not able to be together physically, whether because their status is fully remote or transit to a particular campus location is impractical. Regardless of the reason, the online nature of this meditation persists as an attraction to participate. 

As a mission integrator of the Jesuit spiritual tradition, I find that leading this practice helps me appreciate the diverse ways that Georgetown community members engage in reflective opportunities. Some participants come once in a while and others are present regularly. Regardless of frequency, meditators in the digital practice appreciate that Georgetown is the host for these virtual gatherings. This is especially evident in that the Friday meditation is reserved for an Examen practice modeled on the framework developed by St. Ignatius of Loyola. This Friday gathering tends to draw a larger group and I think this reflects the transformative potential of this core Ignatian practice. 

I encourage anyone in our Georgetown community in need of some dedicated mindful quiet to consider signing up. We will continue to make this available, along with other in-person opportunities, to a growing population of spiritual-seeking Hoyas on the Capitol Campus and beyond.

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2025 SCS Student Retreat Explores the Spiritual Richness of Centering in Quiet and Community

This year’s SCS Student Retreat, “Quiet, Center, and Connect,” gave participants a needed opportunity to seek both rest and reflection from their engaged lives of work and study at a time of great disruption and uncertainty. 

One of the great joys of the calendar is the annual overnight retreat for SCS students hosted in March at Georgetown’s Calcagnini Contemplative Center. This past weekend, nearly two dozen SCS students from an array of programs, representing the rich diversity of the School’s student body, journeyed into the Blue Ridge Mountains to experience first-hand the university’s value of Contemplation in Action. 

The theme of the retreat was “Quiet, Center, and Connect” and participants were invited to more fully engage with each of these not as abstract concepts but opportunities for deeper spiritual practice. Led by myself and Rabbi Rachel Gartner, the School’s senior advisor for spiritual care, the retreat experience builds on years of innovating the overnight retreat approach to meet the needs of the diverse learners at SCS. One of the most incredible dimensions of the SCS retreat, which was again realized in 2025, is how much personal and communal spiritual transformation is possible in only 24 hours. 

The first day of retreat was filled with all of the details of travel and transition, from the anticipated gathering at the SCS building to the bus ride out to the Calcagnini Contemplative Center. Despite having a sense of “who” signed up for the experience based on information captured on the registration form, the retreat team only begins to get to know the composition of the retreatants during this transition period. Upon arrival, the group oriented to the site, making immediate notice of the incredible natural environs of Bluemont, Virginia. The sensory experience of Calcagnini was enhanced by the bright sun and clear skies—quite the difference from last year’s rain-soaked first day!

After transitioning our bodies to the location, we began to transition our fuller selves to what the retreat entailed. In a sacred circle, we introduced ourselves to each other by naming the desires that brought us on retreat. We then engaged the first practice, Quiet, by settling our minds and bodies and sitting in pure silence for 10 minutes. This helped the group lower the literal and symbolic volume of busy life, which was then reinforced by time for silent solitude in nature before dinner. 

Rabbi Rachel Gartner led exercises based on “In Your Shoes” and retreatants learned about each other by telling each other’s stories. 

Dinner on day one engendered deeper bonds of affection and fellowship among attendees. This spirit of community carried over into the second practice, Center, in which I invited retreatants to center themselves with a spiritual practice of mindfulness meditation based on Centering Prayer, a tradition in contemplative Christian spirituality. Each of us in our silence chose a sacred word or phrase to help gently push aside the mental and emotional distractions and return to a deeper center. This led to the opportunity to share in small groups about what is at the center of our lives these days. The affectionate and supportive small groups created caring containers for active listening. The first day ended with an Examen meditation from the Jesuit spiritual tradition and the opportunity for socializing with games and snacks. 

The sunny weather in Bluemont, VA helped participants ease into the experience and enjoy the natural surroundings. 

Day two featured the spiritual leadership and guidance of Rabbi Rachel Gartner who led a series of dialogue-based activities modeled on her work at Georgetown’s Laboratory for Global Performance & Politics, in particular the “In Your Shoes” program. While new to most—if not all—participants, the methodology of acting out the scripts based on recorded one-on-one conversations helped build greater awareness and attunement to both the burdens and the joys that SCS students carry. The breakthroughs in self and community were evident in the morning of day two as retreatants began to prepare for lunch, evaluation, and departure back to campus.

There is no single way to measure the success of a retreat, but one informative indicator is how the participants evaluate time on retreat in their own words. Here are some testimonies from the 2025 group: 

  • “I am leaving the retreat with so much joy and gratitude. The silent time and nature have allowed me to recharge and get a new perspective. It is a blessing to be able to be in this place and be intentional about reflecting on my life and purpose. It was nice to meet new people in different programs. I leave this special place with gratitude.”
  • “I feel more grounded. I have a clearer sense of what I want for myself and how I want to approach the journey of transformation.” 
  • “I feel freer and more hopeful. This has been good for me to leave some of the worry about the future behind me.” 

I hope this retreat continues to nourish the participants and inspire others to sign up for a future retreat! 

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Religious Communities at Georgetown Prepare for Holy Seasons of Lent and Ramadan

This week’s post encourages reflection about how the upcoming religious seasons of Lent and Ramadan have spiritual insights that are universally valuable. 

Georgetown takes special pride in being an institution where religious ideas are not only discussed but also practiced. The University makes space for these practices and invites the entire community to grow in awareness about the religious significance of particular religious holidays and sacred times for particular communities. On the eve of the University’s spring break, Georgetown’s Christian and Muslim communities are earnestly preparing for Lent and Ramadan. These are the holiest seasons of the religious calendar for these faith traditions and together they offer meaningful reflection opportunities for everyone regardless of personal religious beliefs. I would like to present a few connections between these observances and our ongoing mission-based responsibility at Georgetown to lead generous lives in the service of others.

Both Ramadan and Lent are inherently about growing in closeness with God and solidarity with others, especially marginalized persons, through intentional practices. For both of these holy seasons, fasting is a primary practice that helps focus one’s attention on what matters most in our lives. The regular act of fasting has the potential to purify one’s desire for God by helping us become more aware of our dependence on God and all of the things that interfere with growing closer to God. This spiritual insight translates more broadly. We might ask: What habits or behaviors get in the way of knowing your deepest and truest self? Is there some “inordinate” attachment, as St. Ignatius might suggest, that you might fast from in order to grow in this greater self-awareness that leads to more awareness of the Transcendent?

Both Ramadan and Lent also emphasize the social and community dimensions of religious commitment. Almsgiving and charity are common practices in these seasons, intended to foster intentionality about how living a life oriented to God means living a life with and for others, especially those most excluded from the gifts of life. Solidarity then becomes a religious value of Lent and Ramadan and encourages more awareness of the needs of others and how we are called to be in service to the common good. The prayerfulness of Lent and Ramadan has the potential to facilitate a kind of contemplation that leads to more and more generosity and service. We might ask: How is this time of intense spiritual discipline calling me to use my gifts and talents for encouraging justice and the common good? 

These are only a few ideas about the broader meanings of Lent and Ramadan. I encourage everyone to consider any personally relevant significance of the practices and commitments at this time in the religious calendar.

Learn more about observance of Lent at Georgetown by signing up for Georgetown’s Daily Lent Devotional and by consulting the religious services calendar. You can learn more about Ramadan by also visiting the religious services calendar and signing up for newsletters from Muslim Life at Georgetown.  

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SCS Students: Looking to Quiet, Center, and Connect? Sign Up for Annual Retreat

This week’s post is an encouragement for SCS students to sign up for the annual overnight retreat taking place in March.

A hallmark of the Georgetown student experience is the opportunity to participate in retreats facilitated by the Office of Mission and Ministry. Whether these experiences take place on campus in the context of daily life or removed from the city at the University’s Calcagnini Contemplative Center in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, Georgetown retreats put the Jesuit value “Contemplation in Action” into practice. 

St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits, believed that busy and engaged people needed forms of prayer and reflection suited to their committed and active lives of service. Short retreats bring this vision to life by giving students an opportunity to pause and take a break from the frenetic pace of life and work without losing connections with the purpose of their academic and  professional activities.

This year’s SCS student retreat animates this characteristic of Georgetown by bringing together the diverse community of learners at SCS for a shared experience of intentional rest and relaxation in a contemplative atmosphere. Framed around the theme of “Quiet, Center, and Connect,” this year’s event will build on the tradition of past annual retreats. This 2025 theme speaks especially to the need for disengagement from the ever-present demands posed by our digitally distracting modern life. The pace of current events and the temptation to follow and react to everything happening in real-time can be detrimental to our inner lives. Generous action in the world depends on our being able to locate and activate the core of our true selves, a task that is only realized with intentional spiritual practices. 

By quieting, the retreat hopes to help students push aside the intrusive noises. By centering, the retreat hopes to help students focus on what really matters. And by connecting, the retreat hopes to help students to relate to others in ways that build the bonds of unity and community in a time of polarization and fragmentation.

There are few remaining spots, so interested students should sign up today! 

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Welcome to the Spring Semester!

Preparing for Inclement Weather | Office of Emergency Management | Georgetown University
This week’s post invites a reflective pause at the beginning of a chilly and snowy spring semester. As you enter this new period, what are your desires for this semester? How are you taking time to pause and reflect?  

The spring semester is upon us! It is a funny time to enter a “spring” season when the weather in Washington, D.C. feels pretty far away from the delightful summer temperatures of May. As is customary in the life of an academic institution, however, the changing of the semester is an opportunity to reflectively transition from what came before to what comes next. The life of a university seems to stop between semesters but the world obviously does not. We enter a 2025, both filled with hope and possibility and mired in despair and suffering, evidenced by the devastating wildfires this week in California. Such an event reminds us of the mission of Georgetown for which we are all responsible and calls us to transform our education into a generous force for justice and the common good.

SCS is a dynamic and diverse learning community whose students operate within a range of program formats, meeting times, and modalities. However, every semester at SCS welcomes new members to our community. So whether you’re a new SCS student beginning your first semester, a continuing student, or a member of our faculty or staff, this opportunity to slow down, catch your breath, and prepare your mind, body, and spirit for the coming semester might be a welcome invitation. Here are three ideas for how to meaningfully enter into quiet before a new semester begins. 

Renew. As you prepare for a new Georgetown semester, take some time to get in touch with your motivation for being here. What drew you to Georgetown? What inspired you to take on your particular program? What are your desires for your experience at this University? As you begin to reflect on these questions of your “why,” it might help for you to familiarize yourself with the deeper purpose of Georgetown as an educational community. You can spend this time with this Mission in Motion post: New to SCS? An Introduction to Georgetown’s Mission and Values in Four Points. 

Review. Spending time renewing your commitment to your Georgetown education might lead you to consider your future and where you are heading. But it is also important to take stock of where you have been and how you arrived at this current moment. Reviewing your past for the sake of reflecting on how your prior lived experience might inform your present and future is at the heart of the Jesuit spirituality that animates the mission of Georgetown. New members of our community might benefit from better understanding how Georgetown lives out its Catholic and Jesuit mission by reading through the most recent Mission Priority Examen self-study report. One of the core practices arising from the Jesuit tradition that helps in this review process is the examen of consciousness. You might consider signing up for the SCS Daily Digital Meditation sessions, which include a weekly examen that occurs every Friday. In whatever ways you construct a practice of review, I invite you to explore how your present self reflects the authentic fullness of your entire journey of life. 

Recharge. Taking up “rest” as a meaningful practice of spiritual wellness is a challenge in a culture that values constant activity and valuing one’s life choices on the basis of utility or value maximation. Rabbi Rachel Gartner, SCS Senior Advisor for Pastoral Care, reminds us that the Jewish tradition of “Shabbat” requires that we “leave behind the regular flow of time and the productivity we imbed in it. We do this not in order to escape life, but in order to enter into it more deeply.” My hope is that you can find some intentional ways to truly rest in the time as this busy semester gets underway. Take lots of walks and try to transform your walks into spiritual experiences (you can even try out a Walking Examen!). Take time for silence. Truly enjoy the company of others. Give yourself some space to unplug from the daily distractions. Your soul will thank you! 

One of the great joys of working at Georgetown is welcoming new members into our community multiple times in the year. There is so much anticipation as a new semester begins. The anticipation at SCS is even greater in this new year as we plan for a move to 111 Massachusetts Avenue this summer and the creation of an ever more cohesive Capitol Campus. My hope is that you can savor these chilly days and arrive most fully in the early weeks of this new semester.