Fr. Jim Hederman, SJ

Fr. Jim Hederman, SJ (NEN), a native of Brooklyn, NY, graduated from Canisius College a magna cum laude Biochemistry major. He attended SUNY-Downstate Medical School. His residency in Psychiatry was at Hahnemann University in Philadelphia, where he also trained in Family Therapy, focusing his dissertation on Friendship Support. Board Certified in Adult & Adolescent Psychiatry, he worked at the Philadelphia Child Guidance Center & the Carrier Foundation in NJ. He has been on the faculty of Hahnemann & the University of Pennsylvania as a clinical instructor.

Fr. Hederman entered the Jesuits in 1992 and he has continued his work with youth at Boston College High School, Boston Boys’ Choir School, & Fairfield College Preparatory School in CT. He has provided support groups in grief & divorce issues, designed & taught a program on human sexuality for 12 years, been very active in the Kairos Retreat Program in Boston, CT, NYC, and in Australia, and has served as chaplain providing the sacraments and pastoral counseling. Following the 9/11 attacks in NYC, he gave retreats of healing to the staffs of Fordham Prep and Xavier High School, both hit hard in the disaster. While receiving his Masters of Divinity & Masters of Theology at Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge he was chaplain to Harvard’s Catholic Medical Students. He served on the Boards of Trustees for BC High (‘03-’06) & Hall-Brooke Psychiatric Hospital (’04-’06) and supervised divinity students from Yale interning at Prep. He has presented on the topics of “Developing Communities at Prayer” & “Identifying Students at Risk” at two national Jesuit Secondary Education Association meetings and lessons learned as a clinician in the high school at the New England Province Assembly for Secondary Education at the College of the Holy Cross. He completed his Jesuit Tertianship in Australia in 2006, including work in New Zealand & Vietnam. He has trained in spiritual direction at Inisfada and Los Altos. He recently completed four years as the Director of Campus Ministry at BC High.