Meet the Jesuits: Jim Coughlin, S.J.

05/24/2018

For Jim Coughlin, S.J., education and the Jesuit mission have been the driving forces of his decisions and a constant presence in his life, through many roles from math professor to aquarium enthusiast and choir director.

Growing up in Upstate New York, Coughlin attended a Jesuit high school, where he was first introduced to the spirituality that would become his own. He’s spent most of his 30 years as a Jesuit working on the East Coast, teaching in high schools. That work has included seven years as a principal at his alma mater in Rochester, and work in a parish in Boston.

When his provincial authorities asked him to consider moving to St. Louis, it was a bit of a culture shock.

“This is the furthest West and South I have ever lived,” Coughlin said. “I’ve only been in the Northeast.”

Coughlin began his current role at Saint Louis University at the start of this past academic year. While still getting his feet wet, he considered his role as an adjunct professor in math and as an assistant in forming young Jesuits in Bellarmine House to be a privilege. Helping Steven Schoenig, S.J., rector of Bellarmine House, to form young Jesuits who are coming into their own is something that’s particularly special for Coughlin.

“Formation was such a great time for me,” he said. “It made me who I am 30 years later. So, to be a part of that, to walk with these men as they peel back the layers of their own education, it’s very exciting. It’s a great privilege, and so far, I really love it.”

Coughlin also loves his job teaching math to undergraduates – from getting to know his students in office hours to teaching them the beauty and value of the mathematic and scientific world. He believes “math is the language of God.”

He loves encouraging young people to look past notions that science and faith contradict each other, and he hopes to impart a love of God and an appreciation for the world in his students.

“When I look at the periodic table, I see the hand of God,” he said. “There’s order, and there’s surprise, and there’s brilliance, and there’s impishness. And it’s all right there in the structure of the periodic table. How can you not see God? We see a spark that points toward a faith and life and purpose that is way beyond that of the physical world but is reflected in the beauty of the physical world.”

That love for the physical world also inspired Coughlin to care for fish from a young age. Coughlin recalls receiving his first aquarium at age 7, from his siblings. Instead of quickly becoming uninterested in it like many children his age, he recalled, “I went to the library and got all the books I could, and I started to read about the ocean and how complex the wind and light is. It just drew me in.”

He’s carried that love of the life aquatic with him on his journey to the Gateway City by bringing his own aquarium to St. Louis. It decorates the entryway to Bellarmine House. That aquarium delights visitors and residents alike at Bellarmine House and has been the subject of many of Coughlin’s homilies.

If teaching math, caring for marine life and forming young Jesuits isn’t enough, Coughlin also recently added a new title to his resume, choir director for the Campus Ministry Masses at College Church. Music is another thing that’s been part of Coughlin’s life since childhood. He played the organ at his elementary school Masses and has been involved in music ministry since the 1970s.

“Music was such the seed of my own vocation,” Coughlin said. When given the opportunity to form others in prayer and in music, he jumped right to it. “There is power in singing that can move the heart. That is such a powerful expression of prayer.”

Though Coughlin is a mathematician, the caretaker of his fish and the choir director at St. Francis Xavier College Church’s student Masses, he is primarily and proudly a Jesuit. What does he want others to know about that role? That they’re an order full of life.

“We love life. We are not an order that turns our back on the world – we are an order that engages the world. We delight in it. We find God in the world, not from escaping it, and we can delight in our particular subject area. We see the reflection of God right there – and it’s delightful to find God in the periodic table, or in a spectacular cabernet, or in a marvelous salad that someone lovingly prepared for you.”

Story and photos by Molly Daily for University Marketing and Communications