“Same but different”

September 28, 2011 in General, News

boleary_01“The Same but Different: An International Symposium on Mary Ward and the Ignatian Constitutions” took place on 10 September,  hosted by the Jesuit-run Heythrop College at the University of London. Brian O’Leary SJ (pictured here) of the Irish Province, reflecting mainly on the Constitutions, argued that Mary Ward discovered in them ‘an excess of meaning’ that revealed their potential to be lived by women. Gill Goulding CJ,  of the Univerity of Toronto, traced the stages of Mary Ward’s discernment as she came gradually to understand that the Ignatian Constitutions were what she had always longed for. And Mary Wright, IBVM, considered the rules of the other religious congregations that Mary Ward examined and then rejected. Brian enjoyed meeting with many colleagues whom he had not seen since the glory days of the late but still fondly remembered Joe Veale SJ.