Daniel Berrigan 100 -- May 9, 2021

 

Time, 25-October-1971

Father Daniel Berrigan SJ, Jesuit priest and antiwar activist, was born 100 years ago today, on 09-May-1921. Daniel was probably the first Jesuit I knew anything about. Daniel and his brother Josephite Father Philip were leaders in the anti-Vietnam War movement. Daniel served six years in prison for his War protests with the Catsonville Nine. Daniel gave pastoral care to AIDS patients, who were often cut off by their families and their churches. 

 “Start with the impossible. Proceed calmly towards the improbable. No worry, there are at least five exits.”

Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ 175 -- July 28, 2019

www.listal.com

Poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ was born 175 years ago today, on 28-July-1844.  In 1866, he converted to Roman Catholicism.  In 1868, he became a Jesuit novice.  He was ordained in 1877. Most of his poems were not published until long after he died in 1889.

I first read  his poetry while I was in high school and I enjoyed his unorthodox style.

Pied Beauty

Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.