Fr. Andrea Bianchini, SJ

• Born: September 4, 1981

• Entered Society: August 25, 2012

• As a Jesuit: Father Bianchini worked one summer with migrants at the Kino Border Initiative at the U.S.-Mexico border in Nogales, Arizona; trained as a hospital chaplain for a summer at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Illinois; volunteered as a kindergarten teacher’s aide at St. John Chrysostom School in the Bronx, New York.

• Assignment Following Ordination: Father Bianchini will do a residency program in clinical pastoral education at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Illinois.

To tell my vocation story in six words or less would be to say: “Put out in deep water.” One of the highlights of my time as a novice was spending six weeks with people with various disabilities in a L’Arche community in Cleveland. Spending a summer with migrants and accompanying college students to the Kino Border Initiative at the U.S.-Mexico border in Nogales, Arizona, and Nogales, Mexico, were two deeply transformative experiences that marked my regency. Being with migrants and refugees showed me how God is present and can be encountered in a unique way in the poor and marginalized. I also learned how faith in God can be a source of hope and strength in the midst of the gloomiest predicaments. This experience profoundly influenced my approach to ministry and made me more aware of my responsibility to announce the Gospel.

My Jesuit vocation has taken me to places I never thought I’d go, including a female federal jail in Dublin, California, to offer spiritual direction to the inmates. Although I went there to help them with their prayer, it was actually my own prayer that benefited the most. Seeing God so conspicuously at work in the lives of these women made me more attuned to and responsive to God’s voice.

My favorite saint is St. Teresa of Ávila because of the depth of her spiritual writings and the fortitude she constantly displayed in front of incredible challenges. I especially admire her unwavering trust in her mystical experiences despite the opposition of many reputed church ministers. She’s a true testimony to Ignatius’ conviction that God can communicate directly to people “like a schoolmaster teaches a pupil.”

Large photo by: Art Montes
Inset photo by: Steve Donisch