By Jose Kavi

New Delhi, July 5, 2020: Australian-born Jesuit Father Paul Jackson, who promoted Christian dialogue with Muslims in South Asia died on July 5 in Patna, capital of the eastern Indian state of Bihar.

Father Jackson died at 6:45 pm in the Holy Family Hospital at Kurji, a western suburb of Patna, says a message from Father Selvin Xavier, socius or executive assistant of the Patna Jesuit province where the Australian had spent most of his missionary life.

Father Jackson was 83 and a member of the Society of Jesus for 64 years.

“He belongs to Hazaribag province but applied to Patna Province as he spent most of his life in Patna,” Father Xavier’s message adds.

The Patna socius hailed Father Jackson as an Islamic scholar, teacher, writer and the man who spearheaded the Christian-Muslim Dialogue in Jesuit’s South Asian Assistancy or region.

The funeral is scheduled at 4 pm on July 6 at the chapel of Xavier Teacher Training Institute in Digha Ghat, 3 km further west of Kurji.

Jesuit Father Victor Edwin, secretary of the Islamic Studies of Association, expressed shock over the death of Father Jackson, whom he considers his guru.

“I am deeply sad,” said the young Jesuit, who had last met the Australian in May 2019. He says Father Jackson’s departure is a great loss of the Church’s efforts to reach out to Muslims.

“Father Jackson, through his life and scholarship, guided me into this ministry of dialogue with Muslims. He emphasized deep knowledge of Islam in its different dimensions and personal relations with Muslims as key to dialogue with Muslims,” Father Edwin told Matters India on July 5.

“He cared for the Islamic Studies Association and its members. “I felt deeply moved as once he wrote to me: ‘Edwin, your work brings consolation to me’.”

In an earlier interview, Father Edwin, a lecturer in Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations at the Jesuit’s Vidyajyoti College of Theology in Delhi, said Father Jackson had understood that an “openness to receive” is at the heart of dialogue.

This had included emulating the Sufi Sharafuddin Maneri in rigorous study, sustained teaching activity and relentless service of the people, Father Edwin recalled.

Some Muslim leaders too mourned the Jesuit’s death.

Akhtarul Wasey, president, Maulana Azad University in Rajasthan’s Jodhpur town, mourned Father Jackson’s death.

“So sad! A noble soul, a great scholar of Islamic Studies and a gem of a person has gone. He will always be remembered for his seminal work on Maktubat Sadi of Hazrat Sharfuddin Yahya Maneri and more than that for bridging the gap between Christians and Muslims. May his soul rest in peace,” he said in a message.

Paul Frederick Joseph Jackson was born on June 11, 1947, in Brisbane, Australia as the only son and eldest among four children of Frederick and Violet Jackson.

He joined the Society of Jesus in 1956 and came to India after philosophy at Watsonia Loyola College, Melbourne, in 1961.

After theology studies at St. Mary’s, Kurseong, in West Bengal state’s Darjeeling, he was ordained a priest on March 7, 1968. He studied history at Jamia Islamia Millia University in New Delhi and doctorate from Patna University in 1980.

He was leading a retired life at XTTI since 2010 and was then moved to Xavier Bhawan, province infirmary, in December 2017.

Father Jackson arrived in the Hazaribag area of present Jharkhand state in 1961 to join a group of fellow Australian Jesuits.

During the 1960s, he searched for ways to respond to the call of the Vatican Council II for Catholics “to open the windows” of their religion.

“One of the most pivotal moments in my life is when I said to myself, let me try to do something for the Muslims,” Father Jackson related his entry into dialogue ministry in a 2017 interview.

He began to learn Urdu, the language of South Asian Muslims, as well as ubiquitous Hindi.

In 1976, he began doctoral studies on Serafuddin Maneri, the famous 14th-century Sufi Islamic mystic of Bihar. After his doctorate, Father Jackson began organizing “Exposure to Islam” courses for Jesuit regional theology students in Patna.

He would send students two by two to spend 10 days with both poor and middle-class Muslims as well as Sufis. He translated Islamic documents, wrote articles on Islamic themes and addressed Muslim conferences and seminars.

All this helped fellow Jesuits to become more open to inter-faith dialogue than they were several decades ago.