MARY LEE TALBOT
Staff Writer
When I did some research about Fr. Greg Boyle, S.J., the words compassion, cherished, loved seen and kinship kept appearing. In the YouTube video “The Secret Sauce of Homeboy: The Power to be Seen and Cherished,” there is this line: “The Homeboy Way is a movement of radical kinship — where walking to the margins creates a new center for us all.” It also says Homeboy is a place where “people are seen cherished and given space to heal.”
If you go shopping at the Homeboy merch store on their website, you can find quotes from Boyle on hats, t-shirts or coffee mugs, such as “Love never fails. It will always find a way to have its way”; “Sooner or later, we discover that kindness is the only strength there is”; or “You are exactly what God had in mind when he made you.”
Since at least 2012, Boyle has been speaking and preaching to Chautauquans, and he will serve as the chaplain for Week Nine. He will preach at the 10:45 a.m. Sunday morning worship service in the Amphitheater. His sermon title will be “Fill the Earth With Mercy.”
He will also preach at the 9:15 a.m. Monday through Wednesday morning worship services in the Amphitheater. HIs sermon titles include “A Love that Keeps Us Sane,” “The Table That Has No End” and “The Infinite Moment When Everything Happens.” He will also share his faith journey at the 9:15 a.m. morning worship service in the Hall of Philosophy.
Boyle is a Jesuit priest and the founder of Homeboy Industries. Based in Los Angeles, the organization is the largest gang intervention, rehabilitation and re-entry program in the world.
From 1986 to 1992, Boyle served as pastor of Dolores Mission Church, then the poorest Catholic parish in Los Angeles and the one with the highest concentration of gang activity. In the face of law enforcement tactics and criminal justice policies of suppression and mass incarceration as the means to end gang violence, Boyle and parish and community members adopted what was a radical approach at the time: Treat gang members as human beings.
In 1988, they began what would eventually become Homeboy Industries, which employs and trains former gang members in a range of social enterprises and provides critical services to thousands of people who walk through its doors every year seeking a better life.
Boyle is the author of the 2010 New York Times bestseller, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion, as well as Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship and The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness. He authored Forgive Everyone Everything, an anthology of writings accompanied by Fabian Debora’s artwork. His latest book is Cherished Belonging: The Healing Power of Love in Divided Times.
Recently, Boyle was a recipient of the 2025 Civic Renewal Award from the Center for Christianity and Public Life. In 2024, Boyle received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Joseph Biden. Homeboy Industries was awarded the 2020 Hilton Humanitarian Prize, and Boyle was the recipient of University of Notre Dame’s 2017 Laetare Medal, the oldest honor given to American Catholics. In 2014, President Barack Obama named him a Champion of Change. Boyle has also received the California Peace Prize and been inducted into the California Hall of Fame.
This program is made possible by the generous support of The Lois Raynow Department of Religion Fund and The Daney-Holden Chaplaincy Fund.
