A journey to the Ignatian Leadership

My name is Sami Creta, I started to work at the jesuit cultural center in Alexandria since 2014, just after I finished my Master’s degree in cultural management in Italy.

I have participated in The Ignatian Leadership program last February in Rodizio retreat house in Portugal, the program was focusing on technicalities of Leadership in general but from an Ignatian perspective.

Communication, conflict resolution, relationship with power and communal discernment were main subjects of the program. In our Jesuit organizations we deal everyday with different situations that requires a deep listening to analyze the problems and discern about various decisions with a different way of doing that embrace the whole ecosystem of organization.

On another note, the feeling of belonging to the large Jesuit family was a major side to this meeting. Through the diversity of the participants in this program, including some of whom recently joined the work and got to know the Ignatian family. It is also worth noting that there was a clear discrepancy in ages, as that family includes any person regardless of age or cultural background.

The feeling of “belonging” is very important in our current time in light of the abundance of information and different trends. There is always the weight of feeling lost from the values ​​that we believe in, especially for people who decided to go far and take risks in search of new places, so that meeting was a renewal of belonging to the big family.

Sami Creta