To My Boys: September 16, 2020
Good morning!
One of my favorite lines comes from a movie that came out in 1997 called “As Good As It Gets.” It stars Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt. In the movie, Nicholson plays an obsessive-compulsive writer who falls in love with a waitress. She is the only one who can serve him at this particular restaurant because no one likes the guy. As the relationship between the two develops, he begins to fall in love with her. At dinner one night, after being insulted, Hunt’s character tells Nicholson’s character to pay her a compliment or she is leaving.
The scene is awkward because the guy is struggling to come up with something good to say. He finally pauses and says very sincerely, “You make me want to be a better man.” Thus, uttering one of the best lines in motion picture history. A line that captures well what we in Jesuit circles call “Ignatian discernment.”
Let me explain. St. Ignatius struggled all the time to discover God’s will for Him and wanted to make sure he followed it. Ignatius would never make a decision without discerning whether that decision was in line with God’s desires. He did this because he realized his purpose in life was to love, reverence, and serve God and so choosing God’s will, even over his own, meant true happiness.
How do you discern? The answer has everything to do with choosing the option that is going to make you a better man. Should I date this girl? Only if it is going to make you a better man. Should I attend this college? Only if it is going to make you a better man. Should I take this job? Again, only if it is going to make you a better man.
The problem is we live in a world that uses another standard of measure to make decisions. Should I date this girl? Only if she is pretty. Should I attend this college? Only if it is the more prestigious, has the better football team, or has the nicest campus. Should I take this job? Only if it makes me a lot of money.
Unfortunately, beauty ultimately fades, football teams lose, campuses grow old, and money runs out. Our choices should be driven by what makes us better men because it is the only thing that lasts and matters. It is important to keep this in mind because the right choice may not always be so obvious. Many times the right choice is not the most attractive one. As a matter of fact, many times the right choice is the more difficult, the less entertaining, the least popular. But ultimately, it is the right one.
As our seniors begin to gear up for their final year at Belen, college choices become a top priority. So much of their attention has to be rightfully placed on where the next chapter of their lives will be. I highly encourage them, as I encourage all my boys, to make sure that when discerning where to go to college, what classes to take, what girl to date, or what decision to make, ask the most important question of all, “will this decision make me a better man?”
Auspice Maria
BELEN JESUIT PREPARATORY SCHOOL
500 SW 127th Avenue, Miami, FL 33184
phone: 305.223.8600 | fax: 305.227.2565 | email: webmaster@belenjesuit.org
500 SW 127th Avenue, Miami, FL 33184
phone: 305.223.8600 | fax: 305.227.2565 | email: webmaster@belenjesuit.org
Belen Jesuit Preparatory School was founded in 1854 in Havana, Cuba by Queen Isabel II of Spain. The task of educating students was assigned to the priests and brothers of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits), whose teaching tradition is synonymous with academic excellence and spiritual discipline. In 1961, the new political regime of Cuba confiscated the School property and expelled the Jesuit faculty. The School was re-established in Miami the same year, and over the next decade, continued to grow. Today, Belen Jesuit sits on a 30-acre site in western Dade County, only minutes away from downtown Miami.