A conversation with the Jesuit priest and author of “The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything.”

Question:rnHow does one become a Jesuit?

James Martin:rnBecoming a Jesuitrnis kind of a long process.  Yournstart as a Jesuit novice, which is two years in a place called the Novitiaternand you do a combination of prayer and working with the poor.  In the middle of all that two years yourndo a thirty day silent retreat based on what are known as the spiritualrnexercises of Saint Ignatius Loyola, which is kind of an imaginative placingrnyourself in the gospel scenes and sort of accompanying Jesus through the gospelrnscenes imaginatively.  After thernNovitiate you take what are called your simple vows of poverty, chastity andrnobedience.  After that you do what isrncalled first studies, which is a combination of philosophy and theology andrnthen following that you do three years of full time work, which is called in thernJesuits, regency.  Most Jesuitsrnlike to teach.  They’ll teach in arnhigh school somewhere.  I workedrnoverseas in the Jesuit refugee service helping refugees in East Africa startrnsmall businesses for themselves. rnSo after that three years is done you go to theology studies and threernor four years of theology studies and if you’re a priest you get ordained atrnthe end.  There is Jesuit brotherrnas well, people who are Jesuits, but are not called to the priesthood and thenrnafter ordination you work full time for a couple of years.  I’m working at a Catholicrnmagazine.  And finally, at the endrnof probably five or six years after that you take what are called your finalrnvows, so the whole process is pretty long.  It took me 21 years to become a Jesuit, which I think was arnlittle too long for my taste, but that is pretty average.  It takes about 20 years to become arnfull-fledged Jesuit.  I like to sayrnit’s like being a made man in the mafia or getting tenure at a university orrnbecoming a partner.  You knowrnyou’ve been in for a while, but you’re finally, finally fully accepted, so it’srna pretty long process.

Question:rnWhat is Jesuit poverty and how has it changed over the years?

James Martin: Poverty is one of the three vowsrnthat we take.  We take a vow ofrnpoverty, chastity and obedience. Initially Saint Ignatius Loyola when he hadrnhis conversion experience he was injured in a battle and was taken home to recuperaternand started to think about doing something else with his life.  He became very ascetical and gave uprneverything and really lived like a hermit, lived in a cave, let his fingernailsrngrow long, his hair grow long and ultimately he realized that this wasn’trnreally doing him much good and he needed to moderate some of this.  He ended up going back to school tornlearn and so he thought, well Jesuits should be free of material possessions,rnbut they don’t have to live you know like they’re hermits, like they’re livingrnin a cave and eating twigs and things like that.  It’s not a complete poverty, so Jesuit poverty is reallyrnabout freedom.  It’s about thernfreedom of not owning.  It’s aboutrnthe freedom of living simply and it’s also about the freedom to not let anyrnpossessions come in between you and God. rnAt the same time it’s supposed to help us identify with the poor.  We do a lot of work with the poor andrnwe’re supposed to try to live as close as possible to what Saint Ignatius callsrna family of slender means, you know people who don’t have a lot and also it’srnsupposed to model Christ.  I meanrnJesus when he lived on the earth was living very simply as a very simple manrnand so those are the three things. rnIt frees us up for service. rnIt makes it so we don’t have a lot of possessions to tie us down.  It helps us identify with the poor andrnit’s an imitation of Christ.  It’srnreally trying to follow Christ more closely.

Question:rnIs chastity really possible?

James Martin:  Chastity is the most difficult thing to explain aboutrnreligious life.  I mean most peoplernthink it’s crazy or unhealthy or unnatural.  After the sex crisis did people think that the sex abuserncrisis from chastity or from celibacy? rnBut it’s really as I see it a different way to love.  It’s certainly not for everybody.  I mean clearly you know most people arernin romantic love and married lives and having children, but for some of us itrnworks and really what it is it’s loving many people freely and deeply.  You’re not attached to just one person.  You don’t have an exclusivernrelationship, so you’re free to love many people, which is not to say thatrnpeople who are married or are in a romantic relationship can’t love manyrnpeople.  It’s just to say that thisrnis what works best for people in religious orders and I find it veryrnfreeing.  I find people can bernfreer with me in a sense.  When Irnbecome close friends with somebody they’re not wondering is he becoming friendsrnbecause of sex.  Does he have anrnulterior motive, something like that? rnMen and women can feel comfortable with you and really in a practicalrnlevel it makes you a lot more mobile. rnYou’re not in a sense worried about what your wife or husband is goingrnto be thinking about your moving or taking a new job, so it can be veryrnfreeing, but it really freaks people out. rnChastity, in a culture that values sex, and rightly so, it reallyrndisturbs people, but I think for those people who are called to it, it can workrnvery well if you live it in a healthy way, meaning if you have friends and havernhealthy work and a healthy prayer life, so I’m all for it, but it’s not forrneverybody. 

Question:rnWhat made you switch from the corporate to the religious world?

James Martin: I worked for GE for six years and I had studied at thernWharton School of Business before entering GE and after about six years Irnstarted to realize that this really wasn’t for me.  Business was a real vocation as it were for a lot of myrnfriends and I just got more and more miserable.  The workload got more difficult.  As anyone who works in the corporate world knows it can be reallyrnstressful and I saw some friends of mine really enjoying the work while I justrnseemed to get bored by it.  At thernsame time I was getting all these stomach problems and sort of stress relatedrnillnesses.  One night I came homerndead tired after this long day of work and I sort of plopped down on our couchrnand turned on the TV and there was the PBS documentary about a guy name ThomasrnMerton who was a Trappist monk, a cloistered monk and I had never heard of himrnand the documentary really just captivated me.  The look on his face just spoke this great sense of joy andrnpeace and calm and consolation and it really called out to me and that was sorninteresting that one documentary that I went out and purchased his autobiography,rn“The Seven Storey Mountain,” which is pretty well known in Catholicrncircles.  I had never heard ofrnit.  I devoured it.  I read it in a couple of nights and Irnreally couldn’t get it out of my mind that that’s what I wanted to do,rnsomething like what he did. I wasn’t particularly religious.  I was Catholic, but I wasn’t superrnCatholic.  I had never thought ofrnanything like that before and I read a lot about Thomas Merton and one day Irnwent up to my parish priest and I said: I think I’d be interested in being arnpriest, which was kind of weird because he had never even met me before. And hernsaid, “Well you know you should talk to the local diocese and you might want torntalk to the Jesuits who are up the street at Fairfield University.”  In Connecticut that was the onlyrnconnection I had to the Jesuits. 

So I visitedrnthe Jesuits at Fairfield.  Theyrngave me some vocational literature, kind of promotional literature about thernJesuits and I read it and I thought this is crazy.  I actually ripped it up, threw it away and thought this is insane,rnthis is not who I am, but I read some more and continued to read.  Around the same time I started to go torna psychologist because of all these stress related stomach problems as a resultrnof work. So I’m reading and thinking and going the psychologist at the samerntime and finally one day he said to me, “Well you know you’re in this businessrnworld and you don’t seem very happy, so what would you do if you could dornanything you wanted to do?”  And Irnthought for a moment and I said I’d be a Jesuit priest and he said, “Well whyrndon’t you?”  And I thought yeah,rnwhy don’t I?  So it made sense andrnI felt, well this is really something that I’m actually interested in.  Why am I doing something that Irndislike?  So I called the Jesuitsrnand they didn’t know who I was and I said I’m ready to enter and they were nicernenough to sort of start me on the application process, which took a couplernmonths, but a couple months later I was in, so it was pretty rushed, but I havernto say looking back on it, it was probably, well it was the best decision I’vernever made. 

Question:rnWhich saint stands out as influencing your life the most?

James Martin:  Well I have to say Saint Ignatius Loyola, the founderrnof the Jesuits who lived from 1491 to 1556.  You know his spirituality, which can be summarized asrnfinding God in all things or being a contemplate of an action, a person who hasrna sense of awareness in the midst of a very busy world, has really changed thernway I live my life.  I think you knowrnfor me Saint Ignatius is kind of the model for all Jesuits, but I don’t justrnlike Jesuit saints.  I also likernSaint Thérèse of Lisieux, who was a nineteenth centuryrnCarmelite nun, who lived what she called her little way, which was basicallyrndoing small things with great love for God.  I love Blessed John the 23^rd, who was pope fromrn1958 to 1963 because he was so funny basically.  One joke from John the 23^rd: a journalist askedrnhim once how many people work in the Vatican and he said about half ofrnthem.  He shows you can be someonernwith a sense of humor and be a saint. rnAnd then finally Thomas Merton, the fellow whose book I read who kind ofrngot me started on religious life, so those are my I’d say top four.

Question:rnDo you need to believe in God to find Saint Ignatius’ insights useful?

James Martin:  You don’t need to believe in God to find his insightsrnuseful.  It helps to understand therntotality of his message because Jesuit spirituality without God or withoutrnJesus you know will only make partial sense, but that being said Saint Ignatiusrnknew that people were on different paths in their life you know to God andrndifferent paths in general and so some of the insights are really useful tornpeople who are not only devout believers, but even doubtful seekers, people whornare agnostic or atheist.  Forrnexample, he talks about how to make decisions, living freely, how to be a goodrnfriend, how to work well, how to be in a healthy relationship with somebody. Sornthere is a lot of things that you can take from the way of Saint Ignatius thatrnare applicable to anybody, but really to understand it in its totality you havernto see it as sort of a path to God, so I like to say that anyone can benefitrnfrom the way of Saint Ignatius, but to get to the final end you really do havernto keep your eyes focused on God. 

Question:rnWhat is spiritual about loving your vocation?

James Martin:  Well a lot of Ignatian spirituality talks about desire andrnthat is sort of a bad word in some spiritual circles because some people equaternit with just selfish wants, like I want a new car, I want a new iPhone, I wantrna new PC, something like that. Or they think of it as sexual desire, which is: ohrnmy gosh, God forbid we should talk about sexual desire.  I mean that’s healthy, right?  But desire on an even deeper level isrnthe desire that we have to be who we are, to be our true selves and the desirernfor God. There are also desires that lead us to our vocations and what we wantrnto do in life. For example, a married couple might discover their vocationsrnthrough desire, so the desire for sexual intimacy, for emotional intimacy, forrna sort of connectiveness.  I meanrnthat brings that together.  Peoplernunderstand that in terms of desire. rnDesire works the same way in terms of our jobs and our vocations.  Someone who is interested in video mightrnbe interested in it because they feel this attraction to it.  It’s really interesting.  They feel this desire for it.  Someone who is a doctor might findrntalking about medicine and the body and things like that just reallyrnattractive, so desire is a really important thing to pay attention to andrnultimately our desires I believe our deepest desires are God’s desires for usrnreally and the deepest desires we have to be our true self, to really live outrnwho we’re meant to be and what we’re meant to do are the ways that God has ofrndrawing us to happiness and also ways that God has of drawing I think tornfulfill God’s desires for the world, so I don’t think we should be too ardentrnon desire in the spiritual life or in any part of life. 

Question:rnDo you believe true happiness exists?

James Martin:rnI don’t think werncan find true happiness this side of life.  There is always going to be certain suffering andrnstruggles.  Everybody has problemsrnin their life, but I think you can obtain a great sense of joy and peace ifrnyour life is centered on God.  Nowrnthat sounds really cheesy.  Whatrndoes that mean?  It means in thernIgnatian way of looking at things, the Jesuit way of looking at things a lot ofrnfreedom and detachment from things that keep you from being connected tornGod.  It means being grateful forrnthe things that are blessings in your life.  It means as a contemplate of action being aware of all thernblessings you have in life, but a certain amount of suffering is inevitable inrnanyone’s life.  I think anyrnreligion, any really healthy religion will tell you that, so full joy I thinkrnis only achieved with God you know in the afterlife God willing, but I thinkrnyou can experience a lot of joy in your life today on earth.  Thank God. 

Question:rnWhat’s it like being a regular on The Colbert Report?

James Martin:rnSometimes you’re onrnshows where people are aggressive or are confrontational and it’s important tornremember to always to be charitable because you know when I’m talking it’s notrnjust representing me or talking about my book.  I’m also for better or worse representing the church and sornif I come off as being argumentative or mean or snappish or whatever thenrnpeople will say look, the Catholic church you know once again you know they’rernbeing whatever, so charity is the first thing and I sometimes get nervous aboutrnthe topics that people choose to bring up.  You never know what they’re going to bring up, but onrnColbert it’s a lot of fun.  I meanrnhe himself is a Catholic, so I know that he understands what I’m talkingrnabout.  He is funny.  One of the great challenges of being onrnthat show is just not laughing.  Irnmean he is so outrageous sometimes and so unpredictable that the things he saysrnjust make me laugh.  One time I wasrnon and we were talking about the recession and how people find God in the midstrnof difficult times and I said that we’re sometimes more open to God’s activityrnin our lives when we’re more vulnerable, which is true because you know whenrnour defenses are down we can let God in more easily, which happens when peoplernare sick or when they’re you know going through difficult times and he said,rn“You make God sound like an opportunistic disease.”  And I thought I guess I do, but it was hard not to laughrnbecause it was so silly, but yeah, I really enjoy being on the show. 

Question:rnWhy do you believe we have an anti-Catholicism problem in the entertainmentrnindustry?

James Martin:rnOn the one hand arernpeople who say that anti-Catholicism is just as bad and anti-Semitism orrnhomophobia or racism.  It’s not clearly.  It’s not as virile and not asrnprevalent.  On the other hand arernpeople that say it doesn’t exist at all, but it does basically.  I think a lot of portrayals of nuns andrnpriests on TV and in the movies are stereotypical.  You know post sex abuse crisis frequently when you see arnpriest show up on a TV cop show you know he is usually a pedophile.  Nuns are usually portrayed as likernninnies basically or stupid.  Irnmean I would say here are women who kind of built the Catholic healthcarernsystem in the United States and ran universities and but when they come on TVrnthey’re portrayed as being idiots basically, so there are some subtlernanti-Catholicism in that.  I thinkrnyou know you hear people taking potshots at priests for being celibate or beingrnpedophiles or being insane or whatever, so I think there is a lot of stuff thatrnslides by you know on TV and in the movies that would never be allowed tornhappen with other groups.  You knowrnif you portrayed a rabbi or an Imam like that people would rightfully complain,rnbut in a way I think because we live in a largely Protestant culture I thinkrnbecause of the sex abuse crisis and I think because of you know some suspicionrnabout the Vatican and Catholic theology in a sense, anti-Catholicism is morernacceptable.  In fact, one personrnonce called it the last acceptable prejudice, so it’s there, but I think wernneed to keep in sort of a context exactly what that means.  It’s not a virile as some otherrnstereotypes are, but it is present.

Question:rnHas it gotten better or worse over the past decade?

James Martin:  I think it has gotten worse because of the sex abuserncrisis.  I think things are saidrnabout priests and celibacy which are stereotypes, so you take a very smallrnpopulation of priests who have committed these crimes then you magnify it andrnyou say well that applies to all priests and you know I read stuff inrnmainstream newspapers and on TV and you hear jokes and things like that. Asrnpriest myself who keeps his vows, it’s offensive. And I often say to people:rnwould you say this about rabbis? Would you say this about Imams? The answer isrnno, but somehow people think because of the sex abuse crisis it’s okay tornstereotype all Catholics.  AllrnCatholics are like this, all Bishops are like this, all priests are like this--rnwhich would never fly for any other religious group, so I just think it’srnbasically unfair. 

Question:rnHas the pope done enough to address the abuse scandal?

James Martin:rnI think he hasrnreally started to do some really important things. His visit to the UnitedrnStates was historic and really unprecedented.  I think though there is always more that can be done for thernsex abuse crisis.  In 2002 the USrnbishops met in Dallas to formulate their zero tolerance policy, which I thinkrnwas necessary, but I think that the clerical culture that gave rise to that. Thernsex abuse crisis, which is essentially a few very sick men who were moved aroundrnfrom parish to parish by some bishops for fear of quote, unquote, causingrnscandal--that’s more of a cultural type thing.  I think that needs to be addressed, so I think what thernchurch needs to do is to have a culture of much more transparency. Frankly whenrnthese guys do these things they need to kicked out. And in the United Statesrnthat has already happened, so I don’t think you’ll see it in the UnitedrnStates.  You might hear reports ofrnones that happened in the 60s and 70s, but going ahead there is this zerorntolerance policy.  I think otherrncountries are starting to realize now what needs to be done.  It really needs to be just sort ofrntaken out root and branch and blamed on the right sources.  It has nothing to do withrncelibacy.  It has nothing to dornwith gay clergy, anything like that. rnNeither of those two things lead to pedophilia.  It has to do I think with this culturernof secrecy and the wrongheaded notion that we shouldn’t quote, unquote, causernscandal by revealing some of these things, so I hope the Catholic church reallyrntakes the lead in showing other organizations about this because you know Irnmean most sex abuse takes place in families.  You know there is sex abuse in schools.  There is sex abuse in children’srnorganizations like the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts, so I think that thernCatholic Church has an opportunity here to really take the lead and be in the vanguardrnof preventing children from being abused.

Question:rnWhat is your problem with Glenn Beck?

James Martin:rnGlenn Beck’srncomment really betrayed a fundamental understanding of the gospel. Jesus in thern25^th chapter of the Gospel ofrnMatthew basically says that the litmus test for how we’re going to bernjudged at the end of our lives is not what church we pray in, how we pray, evenrnhow often we go to church.  It’srnhow we treat the poor.  I mean it’srnpretty cut and dry.  If you want tornenter to heaven, treat the poor well. rnNow social justice is a way of looking at what keeps people poor and asrnthe church in its 2,000 year history has reflected on Jesus’ commandment tornserve the poor and love the poor it has realized that we need to look at whatrnkeeps them poor.  It’s not enoughrnto give someone a handout. It’s important to look at what keeps the peoplernpoor, so someone told me the other day the gospel story of the good Samaritanrnwhere the guy sees someone by the side of the road who has been beaten and herntakes care of him.  He brings himrnback to an inn.  He dresses his wounds.  He gives him money for stayingrnovernight in the inn.  Someone saidrnto me today we’d also be looking at why that road is dangerous.  What is it that makes that roadrndangerous?  How can we fix thernsituations that lead for crime and things like that?  So that is what social justice is.  It’s basically working for a just society.  Now how anybody can be against that isrnbeyond me frankly.  He comparedrnpeople who support social justice to Stalin and Hitler and I just found thatrnfrankly, outrageous.

There have beenrnpeople other than me that have talked about this and he has responded byrnsaying, “Well I didn’t mean this.” rn“What I meant was this.”  “Irnmeant that charity is okay as long as it’s not sponsored by therngovernment.”  But once again, howrnelse does the community respond socially other than through governmentalrnpolicies?  You can do thingsrnindividually.  You can do things inrnchurch, but I mean we have all sorts of public works in terms of socialrnsecurity and Medicare and Medicaid and public transportation. That, in a sense,rnis providing for the common good, so I still think he basically just doesn’t likernthe idea of helping the poor. I think often times this critique of socialrnjustice is really just a thinly veiled excuse for not wanting to deal with thernpoor and a lot of people find the poor as Pope John Paul said, irksomernintruders into our comfortable life. But what good is the gospel if it doesn’trndisturb you?  It’s supposed torndisturb you.

Question:rnWhy is it hip to be spiritual these days without being religious?

James Martin:  It’s very hip to be spiritual, but not religious.  Almost everybody I know says they’rernspiritual.  Now that is good.  I mean spiritual is good.  Spiritual means that you have arnrelationship with God.  Spiritualrnmeans that you connect with God, that spirituality is an important part of yourrnlife.  You try to lead a goodrnlife.  You try to be in concertrnwith what your relationship with God tells you, which is terrific.  You have to have that.  Religious on the other hand in currentrnparlance is bad because that seems to say that oh, I believe in thisrnorganization that has all these hidebound dogmas and beliefs and I would never bernable to belong to an organization that tells me what to think.  The problem with being spiritual, butrnnot religious is that you’re not part of a community in a sense and so there isrnno one to bump up against to tell you when you might be a little offrntrack.  As well, you’re not reallyrnable to connect in your spiritual life with other people.  There is a great saying from IsaacrnHecker who is a nineteenth century American priest and he said, “Religionrnenables us to connect and correct.” rnSo we connect with other people. rnWe’re naturally social animals and we like to worship in common.  That makes sense.  We connect with one another and we’rerncorrected.  If I have a direct linernto God that means that by definition anything I think or say is from God,rnright?  And that’s as we know arnproblem, so being spiritual without being religious means that you’re lacking thernwisdom of the community as well as the support of the community when you’re struggling.  Being religious without being spiritualrnis just as bad.  Being religiousrnwithout being spiritual just means all you’re doing is following rules.  You’re just following rules.  You’re just listening to the communityrnand you’re not reflecting on things yourself.  So the one thing is what Jesus was warning against, beingrnreligious without being spiritual you know to some of the religious authoritiesrnof his day.  What I’m warningrnagainst is being spiritual without being religious, which is much more commonrntoday, so I think it’s not an either or. 

Question:rnWhat’s the worst career advice you’ve ever received?

James Martin:  The worst career advice I’ve ever had was when I was atrnthe Wharton School studying business. I went to my faculty adviser. Whartonrnstudents are supposed to be focused really on the business and I said that Irnwould be interested in taking an American poetry class and he said, “That isrnthe stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.” rnHe said, “Don’t take an American poetry class.”  “It’s a waste of time.”  “No one will care if you ever studiedrnAmerican poetry when you want to get a job at GE, so I would strongly advisernyou not to do that unless you want to be thought you know not serious aboutrnyour job.”  So fortunately I didn’trntake his advice and it’s one of the few courses I remember very well fromrnschool.  The best career advicernI’ve ever gotten was from the psychologist who said, “What would you do if yourncould do anything you wanted to do?” rnI think that’s a question I ask a lot of people and it’s very clarifyingrnfor people because we frequently have these expectations put on us by family,rnby friends about what you should do. rnA friend of mine called that shoulding all over yourself,rns-h-o-u-l-d-i-n-g, rather than saying, “What are my desires?”  “What do I like?”  “What gets me excited?”  And I tend to think that you will dornbetter at things that you’re really interested in because you’re going to spendrnmore time with it.  You’re going tornread about it outside of work and you’ll be enthusiastic about it, so when Irnwas at GE working in business I realized that the people who were going to dornwell were the people who loved it. rnYou know my friends would read The Wall Street Journal and say, “This isrnfascinating.”  And I would say,rn“How can you read that stuff?”  Andrnthey’d say, “This is fantastic.” rn“How can you not read it?” rnAnd so this notion of you know following you desires is reallyrnimportant. What would you do if you could do anything you wanted to do isrnprobably the best career advice or the best question I’ve ever been asked aboutrncareer.  

Recorded on March 24, 2010