Prof. Richard Blake, SJ (Fine Arts)
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Prof. Richard Blake, SJ (Fine Arts) |
With his chairmanship, the operations of the seminar and its journal move next year to BC. Fr. Blake said he hopes their arrival will complement the Jesuit Institute and the Center for Ignatian Spirituality in enhancing the Jesuit identity of Boston College.
Fr. Blake will serve as permanent chairman of the seminar, which has a rotating membership of nine other Jesuits, appointed by their provinces to staggered three-year terms.
He succeeds Rev. John Padberg, SJ, Jesuit historian and director of the Institute of Jesuit Sources at St. Louis University, who served some 12 years in the post.
Calling his predecessor "a tough man to follow," Fr. Blake said he would seek "to continue the work of Fr. Padberg" in maintaining the seminar as "a place for historical and theological studies of Jesuits that will help direct us into the future."
University Vice President for Mission and Ministry Joseph Appleyard, SJ, said, "The seminar will remain a national project of the Jesuits but it will be nice to have it associated with BC. It certainly is a tribute to Dick Blake to be chosen to lead this important work."
Fr. Blake, an award-winning film reviewer for the Jesuit magazine America, is co-director of the Film Studies Program at Boston College. His most recent book is Afterimage: The Indelible Catholic Imagination of Six American Filmmakers.