How I didn’t become a Jesuit

I  am a long way away from home and cannot get hold of a copy of the Bible, and so I am unable to continue my reflection on the psalms this month.

St Michael’s mission in Mhondoro. (Photo: Fr John Gillick SJ/ Zimbabwe Jesuit Archives)

Nevertheless my reflections on the psalms have led me to reflect on my own spiritual journey, and to recall the place where that journey began. The question is where shall I begin?

The question I have just asked myself is almost rhetorical, for I have never doubted when my journey as a Christian really began. The date, time and place are imprinted so vividly in my mind that I don’t even have to think to recall them.

Though I was only eleven years old or thereabouts in terms of my natural birth, this particular event, this birth, is something I can remember, almost even when I am fast asleep!

It was about five o’clock pm on December 24, 1958, by the church bell, just outside the then Old church at St Michael’s mission, Mhondoro, Zimbabwe, that Fr George Muschalek SJ pronounced: “Emmanuel, I baptise you in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit!” Yes, that was the day of my birth — my spiritual birth. That same Christmas night I received Holy Communion for the first time.

No wonder then that the following day, as we walked back home some 30km away, I and others from my school felt elated, for we had been born in the spirit! I felt I was a changed person, and I committed myself to the Lord. That, to me, was my real birth, and I have regarded it as such — because I experienced the birth and saw myself being born!

The next three years were spent at St Michael’s mission where I did the last three years of primary school as a boarder. This was a time of spiritual growth, for I experienced the beauty of a silent retreat; I became a Mass server trained by that inspiring head server, Peter Chokora.

It was such an exciting and uplifting experience to serve at the altar. How I loved the Mass vestments, how tantalising it was to use incense and to ring the bell at Consecration, and how holy it felt to be saying the Confiteo (“I confess”) and other prayers in Latin!

And there was this African priest (who later left the priesthood) who used to get books on the saints for us school children to read. I was inspired by the lives of such saints as Maria Goretti, Aloysius, Ignatius of Loyola, Francis Xavier, Peter Claver, the Uganda Martyrs and others.

Saint Michael’s mission was run by the Jesuit Fathers. There were some Jesuit brothers, and I remember especially the one whom we called “Brother Sausage”, whose real name was Tham. Brother Sausage was a lively ball of energy and amusement.

There were Dominican sisters, most of whom were German, and members of the Little Children of the Blessed Lady, a congregation of indigenous African sisters founded by the late Archbishop Aston Chichester SJ, who headed the diocese of Salisbury, now Harare, from 1931-56.

Considering that the mission was run by the Jesuits and the school children were steeped in what one may call Jesuit spirituality, and considering that the majority of the saints mentioned above were Jesuits, it is not surprising that I found myself believing that God was calling me to be a priest — and that for me to be a priest meant to become a Jesuit priest. I became very pious, so pious that I would get up early, even in the cold of winter, to go to church before the bell rang for the morning Mass.

Winter nights were really cold at St Michael’s. What made them even colder was that we school boys slept on a cement floor, and not on beds. I had an African mat made of reeds. That and a thin blanket separated me from the icy cold cement.

In church there were no benches for school children. We knelt on the bare floor and my knees still bear marks of that hard floor to this day. I became rheumatic in my last year at St Michael’s, but what did it matter? Did I not want to become a Jesuit and a saint?

I told a visiting Jesuit priest about what I considered to be my calling. If I remember well, the priest had conducted a retreat for us. The message was conveyed to Father Superior in Harare. I was subsequently made to understand that I could not proceed to the seminary after primary school. Jesuit priests were highly educated people. I needed to complete high school and possibly go to university before I could go to a Jesuit novitiate.

Needless to say, despite going on to obtain the required academic qualification to be considered for the novitiate, I haven’t joined the Jesuits yet — or, as I often say, I am a failed Jesuit, but I am a Jesuit at heart.

The seeds of this Jesuit spirit were sown at St Michael’s mission, Mhondoro.