The monarch butterfly was little more than a splash of orange across the yawning chasm of blacktop parking lot. It’s amazing my daughter even saw it.

It fluttered a few inches into the air then toppled over, one wing repeatedly dashing itself against the pavement. It moved like a leaf in a tiny windstorm: swaying this way, tumbling that way, bouncing up, down and sideways. Whatever grace had once propelled this creature to dance upon tufts of invisible air currents had given way to desperation.

“Something is wrong with its wing,” my wife said.

“Will it be okay?” my daughter asked.

My wife pursed her lips together. “A butterfly can’t really survive with only one wing.”

An uncomfortable silence fell upon us then, as we watched the sad little insect continue its hopeless attempts to regain altitude. Again and again, it crashed to the ground.

Our daughter wanted to pick it up, hold it. I was against the idea — “Let the thing be!” — but then she said she wanted to carry it upstairs and place it in a flowerpot on the deck overlooking the lake as a final resting place, and well, it was hard to argue with that.

“And maybe it will get better,” she said. “Maybe tomorrow it’ll be gone.”

“Maybe,” we said, though we encouraged her not to get her hopes up.

Carefully, carefully she walked up three flights of steps, through the family home we were visiting and back out into the sunshine. She slowly opened her hands, and the butterfly tumbled out and onto a cluster of pink flowers.

We watched it slowly open and close its wings. We watched as its grip on the petals visibly loosened. We watched as it regained its footing, determined to remain upright, beautiful.

“We’ll check on it tomorrow.”

Tomorrow came and the butterfly was still there, motionless, lifeless, though still full of color. It was a sad moment.

“At least it got to become a butterfly,” our daughter said in the car hours later. She’d been mulling over the whole ordeal. My wife and I were caught off guard. We asked for clarification. “At least it didn’t die as a caterpillar,” our daughter said by way of explanation.

I’ve been thinking about that simple statement for several days now. There was something beautiful and haunting and primal in those words. I’m amazed that, at seven years old, my daughter was able to articulate it. Put simply, we’re made for more; we’re made to flourish. And yet, we don’t all get the opportunity.

I’ve been reading “A Theology of Flourishing: The Fullness of Life for All Creation” by Paul Schutz, associate professor of religious studies at Santa Clara University, in preparation for an interview on an upcoming episode of “AMDG: A Jesuit Podcast.” Undoubtedly, my reading colored my experience with the butterfly and how I heard my daughter’s words.

For Schutz, Jesus’ declaration that he has come so that we might “have life and have it more abundantly” is foundational to the Christian project (Jn 10:10). Our focus can not solely be on the afterlife; we must relish and delight in the goodness God provides in the hear and now. Flourishing, Schutz says, is “an embodied process of self-actualization whereby creatures come to live in the fullness of what they are in relationship with God and other creatures.”

The image of a butterfly is a good one. There’s some comfort, perhaps, in our knowing that the butterfly we laid to rest was — in a measurable though imperfect way — the fullness of life for that caterpillar. It became what God always intended it to be. There is joy to be found in that.

Near and far, it’s not hard to see that we are falling short of the abundant life Jesus desires for us. It’s not hard to see that we are growing numb to this reality, that we are settling into a status quo that I can only imagine our God of abundance finds abhorrent.

And yet, I am buoyed by my daughter’s words. The desire for abundance, for flourishing, for more — the magis — seems to be an intrinsic one. God has placed it in our very selves from the beginning. I wonder what the world would look like if we all unearthed this holy desire, buried in our souls. I wonder what our own lives would look like, what we might do differently.

I wonder what the world would be if we all could live with confidence, trusting that each of us might one day flourish and flutter as our fully formed butterfly selves.

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Deep in the Wisconsin wilderness, between a hemlock and a maple, stands a woman in radiant white. She’s silent, still and waiting — and invisible to all but the eyes of one young woman, a Belgian immigrant named Adele. The year is 1859.

Adele passes the woman in the woods and wonders at the curious sight. She hurries on. Her family believes the specter to be a soul trapped in purgatory, but Adele is not so sure. She sees the woman a second time, now on her 10 mile walk to Mass.

“In God’s name, who are you and what do you want of me?” — those are the words the priest suggests Adele speak to the mysterious woman. And so, upon her third encounter, Adele does.

“I am the Queen of Heaven,” replies the woman in white. “Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation. Go and fear nothing, I will help you.”

Having been given her mission, young Adele Brice sets out to teach about God. She gathers to herself others who desire to embrace this holy task set out by the woman in white. And that mysterious woman? She is better known today as Our Lady of Champion, who in 2016 was designated by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops as an approved Marian Apparition and the first in the United States.

I have forgotten all of this, if I’ve ever known it at all, as I drive along Route 57 north of Green Bay. A sign along the road declares boldly something to the effect of, “The Blessed Mother appeared here! Visit the shrine!” I roll my eyes.

“I bet she did,” I mutter. My wife misses the sign all together yet chuckles all the same. But then I get to thinking, I get to remembering. I’ve recently co-authored a children’s book on Marian apparitions; it involved a fair amount of research, a virtual pilgrimage of sorts following in Mary’s footsteps all across the globe. The name “Champion” comes suddenly to mind.

“Wait,” I say aloud. “I think this is a Marian apparition. I think this is the real deal.” But we’ve missed the turn and have a timetable to keep, and so we travel on.

All the same, I say, “Look it up. Look up Our Lady of Champion.” And my wife does, scrolling through the story and the lore and cross-referencing maps. “Yeah — it is,” she says. “The real thing. Champion — that’s what it’s called. And not too far out of our way.”

We decide to hit the shrine on our return trip. Much to my surprise, our girls are pretty pumped about the idea. They stumble out of the rental car, scamper into the quiet church, fall to their knees in some mumbled prayer. They sit and stare and wonder in the chapel beneath the church, the one with rows of flickering candles lining every wall and relics adorning the back. They ask about the relics, why they’re important. They light candles and say aloud people who they’d like to pray for. They scribble names on the scrap paper for prayer intentions.

We wander the grounds. We pause at the gravesite of Adele — “She’s the one who first saw Mary,” I explain — and we stop at the grotto to Our Lady of Fatima — “I was there, too. Another place where Mary appeared. Cool right?” The girls nod and ask about the gift shop and rush to use the bathroom.

And then we set off again. We’ve a flight to catch, after all.

I find the image of Our Lady of Champion — this woman in radiant white — standing and waiting in the Wisconsin wilds enchanting. She doesn’t move to intercept Adele; she doesn’t call out. She’s just there. And it takes the young immigrant woman’s own curiosity and the encouragement of those she trusts to go before Our Lady. It takes curiosity and not a small amount of wonder for her to be given a mission, a mission to instill in others that same disposition of curiosity toward the awesome mystery that is God.

I think about myself driving by that sign, cynical and focused solely on my task. I think about my sudden spark of wonder and excitement, my wife’s quick-fingered, phone-based research, my girls’ unknowing enthusiasm. I think how those ingredients put us on the path to stand before Our Lady of Champion nearly 170 years after Adele. I think about the importance of religious experience, of encounters that pierce the veil and bridge the spiritual and the temporal.

And I wonder: Am I following in that same mission, bringing our little girls to have their own mystical experience of the Divine, an education at God’s own feet? I think so.

The Society of Jesus today emphasizes our shared mission to show the way to God. I think this is but one small piece, a trajectory-setting moment. We quite literally allow ourselves to be surprised by God appearing on the horizons of our days, nestled between hemlocks and maples, emblazoned on kitschy signs on the side of the road.

And then, turning with that disposition of curiosity and wonder and awe, we go together to God’s own self, still readily appearing, readily available, in the wilderness of our world and the quiet of our hearts. Once there, we let God speak to our souls; we let the Great Teacher show us something new and wonderful of our world and our part therein.

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In Door County, Wisconsin, nestled within Sister Bay and overlooking a smaller section of Lake Michigan sits a popular Swedish restaurant. Tourists flock to the place, and why? Because atop that Swedish restaurant and nestled in rooftop grass sit a popular tourist sight: Goats.

Goats roam the angular roofs doing basic goat stuff. That is to say, there are goats on the roof eating grass, and — consequently — there are people gathered all around the property, necks craned, eyes shielded against the sun, fingers pointed upward, taking photos of those goats just living their goat lives.

It’s an absolute delight.

I don’t know about you, but I’m not what one might call an avid goat watcher. I don’t usually clamor to stand in the outdoor seating area of a restaurant I’m not actually patronizing simply to stare at the roof. I don’t usually rush across a busy street clutching my children’s hands in order to ogle what is one of the standard offerings at most petting zoos. And I’m at best reticent to stand in the summer heat any longer than necessary, let alone while rubbing elbows with other not-quite-avid goat watchers.

But I did all those things this past weekend. More than once. Me and like every other person there. And why? C’mon — there were goats on the roof!

The great Indian Jesuit priest Anthony de Mello wrote in his classic text, “Awareness,” how easily we dismiss the things we think we already know, we’ve already seen. For a child, everything is new; everything is wonderful; everything is distinct. But those of us who’ve been around a while readily abstract the specific thing in front of us into a generalized concept.

Consider the sparrow. De Mello writes: “The first time the child sees that fluffy, alive, moving object, and you say to him, ‘Sparrow,’ then tomorrow when the child sees another fluffy, moving object similar to it he says, ‘Oh, sparrows. I’ve seen. Sparrows. I’m bored by sparrows.’” (p 121)

And yet, we know every sparrow is distinct. We know every aspect of creation is unique — and wonderfully made! St. Ignatius of Loyola teaches us that God is present in all things. De Mello is simply reminding us to look at all things. To sink into the awesome reality that is each individual speck of stardust placed here to reveal some unique wonder of God’s own dream.

God doesn’t want us to aggregate and dismiss; God wants us to marvel in the specificity of this and every moment.

It took putting the goats on the roof to get us to really see them. To marvel at them. It took an extraordinary setup for us to delight in an ordinary situation. After all, what were those goats doing? Eating grass.

Ignatian spirituality challenges us to see the extraordinary in the ordinary. We encounter our God of the universe in all things — the simple and the mundane. But it occurs to me that the rituals of our faith, the sacraments through which God so tangibly manifests Godself, insist that we ground ourselves in the ordinary while simultaneously receiving the extraordinary. Bread and wine. Water and oil. Rings and words.

As we prepare to celebrate the Feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola tomorrow, July 31^st, as we once again remind ourselves that God is truly present and speaking to us in and through all things, I wonder: Where might an extraordinary moment be pointing us back to God already at work in the quiet places of our days? And where might an ordinary encounter offer us a glimpse of the transcendent?

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My family and I watched the 1988 film “My Neighbor Totoro” — one of the most beloved stories from renowned Japanese animation studio, Studio Ghibli — for the first time this past weekend. We loved it.

“Totoro” tells the story of two young girls — Satsuki and Mei — who move with their professor father to an old, abandoned house in the Japanese countryside. They do so to be nearer to the hospital in which their mother is receiving treatment for a long-term illness.

Four-year-old Mei, the younger of the two, finds herself left to her own devices while her father works and her older sister attends school. Curious about the mysterious goings-on happening in her new home, she discovers a magical creature and follows it into the nearby forest. There, she finds more magical critters, ultimately stumbling upon the enormous cat-like, raccoon-bear-adjacent, Squishmallow-before-it-was-cool, titular being called Totoro.

Mei is delighted. But when she wakes up in a clearing in that same forest all alone — save for her sister and father who’d been frantically looking for her — she’s confronted with a terrible question: Was it all a dream?

This is where the story comes upon a crucial narrative juncture. Mei, naturally, is convinced of the fantastical encounter she’s just had. But her sister and father, standing there in a seemingly ordinary forest, have no evidence upon which to base these magical claims, save the utterings of a four-year-old. As the viewer, I’m wondering at this moment: Will a substantial amount of the remaining runtime be devoted to convincing the rest of the family that the forest is pulsing with magic?

There’s nothing wrong with a story that follows a true believer set on winning over those who doubt the proverbial magic all around. That’s why I expected at least some of the plot to be dedicated to Mei convincing her sister and father that Totoro was real — and could ultimately be helpful to the family.

But I was wrong. Mei’s father immediately believes his daughter; in fact, he not only affirms her mystical experience but leads the small family on a pilgrimage to offer gratitude to the forest spirits for their presence. Just like that, Mei’s own enchanted encounter is validated, and Satsuki eagerly sets about looking for one of her own — with her father’s implied blessing.

The world of “My Neighbor Totoro” — and that of many of Studio Ghibli’s most beloved films — is pulsing with enchantment. Characters assume the forests to be alive with spirits; they don’t need to be convinced that reality may be more than what is readily seen by the naked eye.

Now, of course, a story about spirits living in the woods is quite different than a faith that insists on a Triune God present in all things. And yet, I can’t help but think that this disposition — this readiness to encounter the spiritual alive and waiting at every turn — is quite helpful in our own journeys of faith. Certainly, entering a forest expecting to encounter God is a wonderful way of proceeding.

But what most struck me after having watched this film was that narrative choice, the one that said, “Yes, of course Mei’s encounter with spirit was true and worthy of belief.” That decision meant the plot could dive deeper into what those helpful spirits could do in the lives of our characters. The writers didn’t need to spend time convincing anyone of the spiritual reality dwelling in the forest; instead, characters could simply bask in it together. There was no second guessing of self or others; there was simply shared enjoyment and a deepening understanding of what these spirits meant for the characters’ lives.

I don’t want to overdo the lessons to be drawn here — or force them where they are not. But I’m left thinking about how that father immediately believed his daughter. How he affirmed her experience and then journeyed with her on pilgrimage to a sacred place where the whole family could pray together. He allowed her space to grow while also walking alongside her, offering advice, protection and companionship.

The question I’m left with is this: How often do we affirm one another’s experience of God? How often do we cast doubt and shadow on what God may be doing in the life of another? Rather than offer suspicion and judgment, what if we instead offered our hand — and the promise of shared pilgrimage? How much deeper might we descend into the life of God all around us if we spent less time doubting one another and more time journeying together?

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I find myself of two minds concerning the mounds of LEGO pieces strewn about my office floor.

On the one hand, this is all I’ve ever dreamed of, the peak of the parenting mountain. Both of my girls are so delighted by the literal construction of magical worlds that they can hardly bring themselves to end their imaginative play. Castles and creatures and storybook creations stand in various degrees of completion, surrounded by tiny LEGO people dead set on tea parties and weddings and the like. A unicorn has been transformed into a peacock so many times that, at present, it exists as some unholy amalgamation of the two.

Am I happy that my children love the things I love, delve into stories the way I delve into stories, surround themselves with the literal building blocks of imagination, and can barely stand to stomach an end to the flow of creativity? Yes. Yes, I am.

So, that’s the one hand.

On the other hand, my entire office floor has been unnavigable for the better part of the last two months. The cats can’t even pick their way across this carpeted expanse. Am I happy about that? No. Not at all.

And so, I stand before this chaotic clutter of colorful bricks and sigh. Mostly, because if I didn’t sigh, I’d yell, something to the effect of, “Clean this stuff up now!”

It’s an amazing thing that the human mind can behold that which exemplifies all it hoped for, evidence that points to the good, and yet still fixate only on the bad. It’s an amazing thing that I can stand in my office and witness proof that our girls are awesome, that they’re clearly taking after me (in at least some unenviable ways), and still I fixate on how untidy the floor is.

It’s an amazing thing that our God can pour out blessings in abundance, shower us in graces — good health, flourishing relationships, opportunities for growth and delight — and still we are distracted by mundane problems.

It’s an amazing thing, and also a pretty normal and understandable one. Because while a part of me delights in the sight of all those LEGO pieces, another part — namely, my two feet — needs to be able to reach my desk to work. We may all be able to name those blessings that God bestows upon us while also rattling off our unique and overwhelming struggles.

I think that’s important and right. God dwells not only in the beauty and joy of our lives but in the mess of it all, too. God is in all things.

But I do think there is an important spiritual disposition to reflect upon bound up in all this: that of gratitude. Importantly, we begin in gratitude. We stand upon the threshold of our proverbial offices, overwhelmed by the number of LEGO pieces, but all the same start with words of thanksgiving: Even these irritating obstacles point to our God who has given us good things.

And then we go about the work of cleaning up the mess. Of tackling our problems. Of repairing our relationships. Of caring for our health and our world. And we do so in the company of our God of countless blessings.

I wonder: Does beginning in gratitude ground whatever follows in our God who loves us? I know that cajoling our girls to clean up those LEGO pieces takes on a new hue when I begin by remembering what a gift they are, what a gift their creativity and imagination is. I’m reminded of the good — even amidst the mess — and of why it matters, what it points to.

Perhaps, at my best, I see not simply a clutter of colorful toys but a whole story arc, the development of my children, a glimmer of who they might yet be.

I wonder if, at your best, when you bump up against the inevitable messes of life, if a defiant disposition of gratitude doesn’t help you glimpse something more, something beautiful. I wonder how that holy insight might change what happens next.

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I spent the better part of last week in New Orleans. The city’s Jesuit university — Loyola University New Orleans — was playing host to the 2025 JASPA 5-Year Institute. Don’t let the name confuse you: This was the first institute in 10 years; you’ll recall 2020 was a less-than-ideal year for in-person meetings.

What does JASPA stand for? The Jesuit Association for Student Personnel Administrators. These are the folks on Jesuit campuses who, in many ways, are most intimately responsible for accompanying students through the formative years of higher education. Folks in residence life, housing, discipline, wellness, athletics, career planning — anything that falls under the broad umbrella of “student affairs.”

This gathering in New Orleans was a time for these professionals to be together, learn together and be inspired to go back to their campuses and embody our shared Jesuit mission.

One of the highlights, at least for me — decidedly an outsider in this group of student affairs professionals — was the keynote conversation among four of our Jesuit college and university presidents: Tania Tetlow of Fordham University, Vincent Rougeau of the College of the Holy Cross, Salvador Aceves of Regis University, and Xavier Cole of the hometown Loyola University New Orleans.

The panel was given a question from those gathered in the auditorium about the reality of burnout in higher education. Why stay when the work only gets harder? And, more poignantly, how had these four individuals on stage managed to stay in Jesuit higher education for so long?

The panel reflected on the role and value of the Ignatian tradition in sustaining them in their ongoing work and vocation. Dr. Cole offered this brief bit of insight: “I can’t do the work without these tools,” he said, referring to the principles of Ignatian spirituality. “I can’t do the work without this mission.”

What was his advice to folks who may rightly feel overwhelmed by the work? Align why you stay to these tools, to this mission.

Now you may be saying, “This is all well and good for student affairs professionals working in Jesuit higher education. But that’s not me. Why does any of this matter?”

Here’s the thing: I don’t work in Jesuit higher ed either. And yet, this statement — this invitation and challenge — has been rattling around in my head for a week.

I can’t do the work without these tools, without this mission.

These words are for each of us, whether we work in a Jesuit apostolate or not. These words are for those of us who have been formed by the Ignatian tradition, who have gone out into the world to be “contemplatives in action.” These words are an anchor for each and every vocation, for those who are in “ministry” and those who find themselves in so-called “secular” settings. Yes, these words are for those in higher education; but they’re for the rest of us, too.

At least, these words can be for us — if we grapple with what they require. If we rise to the occasion to which they call.

Because Ignatian spirituality is meant to be a lived spirituality, the principles and tools are meant to integrate into each of our unique contexts. They are meant to sustain us in the intimate, nitty-gritty work of accompanying other people: from undergraduate students to colleagues to our own children. We’re all on this journey to God together.

So, what do we do? Spend some time this week reflecting on how the tools of the Ignatian tradition and mission sustain you in your work — whatever it may be. Do you find concepts like cura personalis or magis particularly animating? Or maybe you’re moved by a tradition that doggedly pursues finding God in all things.

Whatever it is, name it; bring it into your prayer. Let God speak to you about how this facet of our global tradition can and will uniquely enliven you in the vocation God continues to unfold through your life.

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The bells tolled from Baltimore’s mother church, the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, late on a Wednesday in mid-June, inviting all people of goodwill to a special Mass for the preservation of peace and justice. The Mass was offered in thanksgiving for the work of Catholic Relief Services, Catholic Charities and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. These faith-based organizations with headquarters in Baltimore are doing the Gospel work of accompanying the marginalized and vulnerable, feeding the hungry, healing the sick, and advocating for peace, mercy and justice. These organizations and others like them find their essential work at risk.

Baltimore’s own Archbishop William Lori celebrated the Mass. I was struck by the words with which he began his homily: “We gather today in a spirit of deep gratitude and with no small amount of urgency.”

Archbishop Lori invited us to offer our thanks to organizations that “witness to the love of Christ in the flesh. In shelters and refugee camps, food pantries and war zones, they serve as the Church’s outstretched hand to the poor, the displaced, the hungry and the vulnerable.”

“We also gather with urgency,” Archbishop Lori continued, “because that work is under threat.” The archbishop quickly reminded us that the suspension of funding for the resettlement of refugees and international aid — not to mention the “fear and anxiety” provoked “among ordinary, hard-working immigrants” — demands our immediate, prayerful attention.

The Gospel that was proclaimed at Mass that day brought us back to the upper room where Jesus’ disciples gathered for fear of meeting his same fate. “It strikes me that in some ways, we too feel we are behind closed doors,” Archbishop Lori reflected, “hemmed in by decisions beyond our control, wondering how we go on.”

It was a powerful image — and I couldn’t help returning to the words with which the archbishop began his homily: gratitude and urgency. Do these words capture the disposition we require in this challenging moment?

Ignatian spirituality, of course, is built on gratitude. We begin each examen by expressing thanks to God. But more than that, we begin in gratitude because it lifts our gazes up and beyond the weeds of our problems and instead settles our hearts on the good — even when that good is hard to see. There’s a practical reason for this: By beginning in gratitude, by giving thanks for the good gifts God has given us, we dispose ourselves to then use them for God’s people, to build up God’s dream. We don’t start by wallowing in hardship and struggle — as understandable as such an act might be — but rather start by realizing, even in difficult times, that God still works through us. So, how might we respond?

This is the work of discernment: Where might we place our unique gifts at the feet of God and God’s people?

“Jesus doesn’t give the disciples a strategic plan or a budget,” Archbishop Lori reminded us. “He gives them his peace, and the Holy Spirit, and then sends them into the world —  wounded, messy and unjust as it may be — to be bearers of reconciliation, healing and hope.” We might hear this as an invitation, as contemplatives in action, to practice urgent hope.

It may sound redundant to say how catholic the Mass felt, how much it fed my own Catholic imagination. Beneath the towering Gothic arches, the words of Scripture were proclaimed in both English and Spanish. Under the watchful eyes of holy women and men memorialized in stained-glass windows or as statues ensconced in shrines along the central nave, priests, bishops, seminarians, nonprofit leadership, donors, advocates, colleagues and friends — all of God’s own people — sang and prayed and chanted, voices reverberating off the old limestone. We could smell the burning incense as it rose high up and into the rafters. We could hear the rattling of the sabers as the Knights of Columbus rose from their pews.

As our gazes were lifted to God’s dream for creation, the veil between the temporal and the sacred was so thin as to be barely perceptible at all, so holy was that moment of communal prayer.

Perhaps that’s why I found myself so moved, struck again by the idea of a Catholic imagination that sees all things as emanating with grace and pointing toward the One from whom all graces flow. Because this Mass was about reminding us of God’s dream for all of creation. It was both an opportunity to ground ourselves in the troubling reality of the day while drawing strength from the reality that God is birthing something new into existence, even now.

The Catholic imagination, I believe, allows us to hold two realities in our minds at once: the suffering of the present and the glory of God’s own dream of peace and justice realized. We stand there — and we stood there quite literally at that particular Mass — between these possibilities. We express that gratitude to God for graces known and not yet named, and we commit as we read the signs of the time to act with urgency as we are uniquely able to breathe new life into God’s dream here and now.

“We remember that the Risen Jesus does not leave us behind locked doors,” Archbishop Lori concluded. “He enters, even now, with a word of peace and a command to go out. So let us go, not in despair, but with the strength of the Cross and the peace of Christ.”

Let us go, then, as the archbishop invites, cultivating that disposition of both gratitude and urgency, with a prayer for peace on our lips and God’s own compassion blooming in our hearts.

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My sister-in-law is a professional photographer — and a very good one at that. When she visits our home, I find myself peppering her with the questions of an amateur photographer. That is to say, my questions.

“There’s something not quite right with my camera,” I confess over coffee and empty breakfast plates during her most recent visit. “It works. I can take good enough photos with it. But … it’s like the lens is a little foggy.”

“You can’t see through your lens?” she asks. She’s rightly perplexed.

“Well, I can,” I confirm. “I mean, I’ve been taking decent photos with it for a while. But there’s something off. Other people have been able to use the camera without any trouble, so it must be me. Or something I’m doing.” Or, I’m slowly going blind.

She furrows her eyebrows, curious. “Can I see it?”

I produce the device in question and pass it to her. She takes it in her hands, studying the settings, the buttons, the works.

“How long has it been like this?”

“Well…”

She grins, pointing at a dial sitting plain and obvious near the camera’s viewfinder. “I think this is your problem,” she says, gently moving the dial back and forth. “You need to adjust this. It’s like you’re at the eye doctor.”

I shake my head. “Wow,” I say. “How embarrassing.”

In this era of easily accessible, on-demand video tutorials, novel-length wiki pages, LinkedIn Learning modules and opinionated Reddit users, I likely appear insane for not spending a wee bit of time investigating my laughably simple problem. I could’ve saved myself a bit of embarrassment — not to mention ocular confusion. But I’m not upset with the outcome. I prefer having a conversation with a real person who can look me in the eyes, think through my unique problem, listen to how the issue is affecting my own day-to-day and then quite literally hold my hand and show me how I might do better, be better.

I insisted on in-person mandolin lessons because I wanted someone to study how I was holding the instrument, pulling my fingers this way and that until I had it right. I seek out colleagues to show me where I’ve gone awry in video editing because I’m just as interested in hearing their own approaches to and lessons learned from navigating complex software as I am in completing the project at hand.

There’s a real difference, I think, between receiving information and technical expertise — important as those things are — and inviting someone else’s lived experience into dialogue with your immediate problems, projects and dreams. And yet, we’re tempted to close ourselves off from engaging others with the knowledge and experiences we need. It’s easy to scour the internet for how-tos and tutorials that we can read and watch without ever bothering another living soul.

Why? Are we embarrassed? Are we reluctant to risk a conversation? Do we want to appear already all-knowing, never in need of another’s unique contribution?

I think about the pride that insists we never risk appearing vulnerable in front of another human being and the humility it takes to admit we simply can’t know it all. I think about the honor at stake in appearing all-knowing, confident and cool, and the rejection we court when we tell someone we need them to look long and hard at our shortcomings. I think about how one path leads to encounter and another to isolation.

And ultimately, I can’t ignore the fact that St. Ignatius counsels us to always walk the way of humility and rejection because that is the way toward Christ and toward community — and how the other direction, the one marked by the Standard of the Enemy, insists on shoring up pride and honors but ultimately leaves us alone and anxious.

Here’s why: The truth still stands that we cannot and will not ever know it all. We’ll always need other people. God has made us to be in community. But are we willing to go to others to learn? Or, do we prefer to pretend we can go it alone?

All this from a breakfast conversation over your inability to operate a camera? you ask.

Yes! Because God is in these simple, quiet moments. And so, it is in these simple, quiet moments that we set the stones in place for our own path to God. It is in these simple, quiet moments that we choose to encounter the depths of one another — or we choose to wallow in isolation.    

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Chester A. France Jr. played the trumpet in the band at Frederick Douglass High School. He is a 1957 graduate of this historic Baltimore city academic institution. His alma mater is one of only two city high schools that admitted African American students during the many years of segregation.

All this to say, Chester is a proud alumnus. And he’s very familiar with those old band uniforms. But nowadays when Chester returns to his alma mater, it’s not as a trumpeter but as the founder of Lifting Labels, a Baltimore-based nonprofit that seeks to reduce poverty, create sustainable jobs and improve the quality of life for folks returning to communities after incarceration.

Chester spent more than three decades in the corporate world. He knows how to put a business plan together, how to talk to and motivate employees, and how to close a sale — skills that have proven essential to the founding and growth of Lifting Labels. But it was his 17 years as the Protestant chaplain with the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services that demonstrated to him the importance of what Lifting Labels might be.

Those years of accompaniment gave him a surprising insight. There are three sewing plants within the Maryland prison system. That means there are countless folks in that system who are spending hours and hours refining this crucial trade. These same folks leave the prison system and return home with newfound skills only to discover there are no jobs to be found that will put their expertise to use.

In 2018, Chester decided to change that. He spent the next many months developing a business plan in collaboration with Innovation Works — another Baltimore-based and Jesuit-backed organization that seeks to connect neighborhoods, entrepreneurs, social innovation assets and investors in order to build sustainable local economies throughout Baltimore. Through Innovation Works’ programming and partnerships, Chester was able to secure enough funding to begin turning Lifting Labels into a reality. Their doors officially opened in 2021.

“If it wasn’t for Innovation Works,” Chester told me, “none of this would have happened.”

Chester was giving me a tour of the workshop. It’s one of several small businesses housed in a beautifully repurposed red brick warehouse located in Pigtown, one of the neighborhoods in southwest Baltimore.

The workshop was quiet when we were there: a rectangular industrial space awash in colorful fabrics, lined with overflowing cardboard boxes and humming with possibility of new ideas and better futures. Mr. Anthony — the lead sewing machine operator — was silently working at one of the handfuls of stations, focused on the thread dancing through his fingers.

Chester showed us the clergy garments that Lifting Labels is perhaps best known for, as well as the graduation stoles and judicial robes and tote bags and more. He stood leaning on an enormous table, showcasing a swatch of camo material that would soon become an apron.

“I never turn down having a conversation,” he was saying. “You never know where it’s going to go.”

I imagine that mentality was a real strength in both his corporate and chaplaincy days. I know it continues to serve him well today. That’s probably how he found himself holding those old band uniforms at Frederick Douglass High School. Chester had been asked to reimagine what those uniforms could be.

So, he brought them back to his small team at Lifting Labels. And now, they’re hoping to collaborate with Frederick Douglass High School to transform those old band uniforms into something new: reversible aprons.

I like that image, that idea of transforming something that was otherwise forgotten, ignored, left to collect dust. I think that’s what Chester and Lifting Labels is really all about. How often do we as a society cast folks to the curb, declare them too far gone and unwelcome in our communities? Certainly, we do that to too many women and men marked by the prison system.

But I think we do that to others, too — all sorts of individuals and communities that we deem unnecessary to our own lives. What a shame. What a tragedy! Because I think one of the many lessons we may take from Lifting Labels is that each of us — no matter our background, our missteps, our skillsets — have the wherewithal not only to contribute to the greater good but to make something beautiful. That’s what they’re doing at Lifting Labels.

I wonder: Where do we need to look to see anew the possibility in those around us and — perhaps just as importantly — within ourselves? Have we been too quick to write someone off? Have we been too quick to forget our own great worth?

“This is a training ground,” Chester told me. In many ways, it has to be. He serves folks who are right out of prison. Lifting Labels reminds them of their inherent dignity and then encourages them on as their lives continue to unfold. “If you find another job,” Chester said, “we’ll help you get there.”

What a beautiful image: the constant unfolding of vocation, encouraged and nurtured and prized but pushed on all the same to strive for the next good thing. No one is written off; everyone instead is woven together.

And the old isn’t abandoned but transformed, made new — a real Easter story.

You can learn more about Lifting Labels by clicking here. And discover the Jesuit-backed Innovation Works by clicking here.

Photo by Eric Clayton/Jesuit Conference

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This past weekend was a big one at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.

After more than seven innings of jumping as if their shoes had caught fire, dancing like their pants were quite literally full of ants and casually throwing limbs in every direction anatomically possible, both my kids and our friends’ kids wound up on the big screen. They were jubilant.

Also, the Orioles won — which isn’t something we can say a lot these days.

But it was those few seconds of stadium-wide glory that really stuck with our girls on the way home: “I can’t believe I was on the screen.” When we went around our dinner table to check in on everyone’s favorite part of the day, showing up on the jumbotron was far and away the highlight.

I’m no expert in appearing on the big screen at sporting events. I suffer from not being an adorable, energetic child and from also not appearing terribly interested in the event at hand. I understand that to be a lethal combination for anyone trying to make it onto the screen.

But we knew how to coach the kids: “Look happy! Look excited! Keep jumping! Dance!” In short, exude joy.

It’s a funny thing to try and catch the attention of a camera operator on the far side of a ballpark by the sheer ferocity of your joyful disposition. It’s no wonder I didn’t make the cut. But the job of the camera operator — of the whole production team, in fact — is to be on the lookout for such displays of unbridled delight. After all, they have to put something on that enormous television. Better to fill the time showcasing happy fans.

But there’s something more going on here, I think. Something worthy of our reflection. What does it mean to send out this kind of joy into the world, knowing that someone is looking for it? What does it mean to be on the lookout for such joy, knowing it’s your job to transmit that happy sight to others? What does it mean, in short, to be part of the joy-filled supply chain?

This supply chain means a lot of things, not the least of which is that we all have a role. Are we the ones dancing and singing, sending joy into the world for others? Are we the ones responsible for spotting that joy, for gathering it up and transmitting it to where it needs to be? Or perhaps we’re the ones sitting in the stands in need of a joy-filled injection. We send joy; we receive joy. We do the work of embodying joy so that others may feel what we ourselves try to manifest.

The world is a hard place, you say in response. And I don’t feel very joyful. That’s fair; I understand. But here’s the thing: Our proverbial supply chain can transmit any number of virtues.

I wonder, then, if joy is too hard to summon forth, we might instead turn to hope. Can we find in our beings that foundational virtue? Can we send it out into the world, knowing that there are so many people near and far who need to see it? And not just see it, not just receive a signal, but feel in their very souls that we’re all in this together, that we still go to God together, that we still look for God’s Spirit at work and still strive to build up God’s vision, that the people of God continue to hope “because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been given to us” (Rm 5:5). And so we don’t simply sit and hope but we get up and love and serve — and we do so joyfully.

I wonder, then, if in the home team’s stadium in the Kingdom of God our own faces might show up on the holiest of jumbotrons to show that we continue to muddle onward, that we show joy and hope and all the rest to stir our own souls and those of others along our shared path toward God’s dream.

I’ll wager that if we do this work, if we showcase joy and hope for the good of others and our own consolation, that our holy effort — and its fruits — will be our favorite part of the day.

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