Dengan penuh syukur, kita mengenang Pater Adolfo Nicolas, yang hari ini wafat di Tokyo. Pater Nico adalah Pater Jenderal Serikat Jesus sejak 2008 hingga 2016.

Pater Jenderal Arturo Sosa menggambarkan Pater Nico sebagai pribadi Jesuit yang “penuh kasih karunia dan kebijaksanaan, sederhana dan tidak pernah berpura-pura. Sebagai Pater Jenderal Serikat Jesus, ia penuh rasa humor, keberanian, kerendahan hati, dan dekat dengan Paus Fransiskus.”

Kita bisa melihat kepribadiannya tersebut dalam doa yang dibuatnya setelah Retret 8 hari:

Lord Jesus, What weaknesses did you see in us that made you decide to call us, in spite of everything, to collaborate in your mission? We give you thanks for having called us, and we beg you not to forget your promise to be with us to the end of time. Frequently we are invaded by the feeling of having worked all night in vain, forgetting, perhaps, that you are with us. We ask that you make yourself present in our lives and in our work, today, tomorrow, and in the future yet to come. Fill with your love these lives of ours, which we put at your service. Take from our hearts the egoism of thinking about what is “ours,” what is “mine”, always excluding, lacking compassion and joy. Enlighten our minds and our hearts, and do not forget to make us smile when things do not go as we wished. At the end of the day, of each one of our days, make us feel more united with you and better able to perceive and discover around us greater joy and greater hope. We ask all this from our reality. We are weak and sinful men, but we are your friends. Amen.

Adolfo NIcholas, SJ