Thomas Worcester, S.J. | College of the Holy Cross

The Jesuits, 1506 - 2006
a Visual Celebration

     The year 2006 marks several anniversaries for the Catholic religious order called the Jesuits (more formally known as the Society of Jesus). It is the 450th anniversary of the death of the founder, Saint Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556). It is also the 500th anniversary of the birth of two of the other first Jesuits: Saint Francis Xavier (1506-52) and Blessed Peter Faber (1506-46).

      SAINT IGNATIUS was a Basque Spaniard who lived at the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the modern world. In his age, Spain was the world’s superpower, with vast territories in Europe as well as a growing empire in the Americas and elsewhere. Around the age of thirty Ignatius underwent a radical conversion from the life of a courtier and knight to a life spent in service of God and of persons in need. Believing himself called to help people find God in their lives, Ignatius went to the University of Paris for an education in philosophy and theology. There he became friends with an international group of fellow students who would eventually found with him a new religious order called the Society of Jesus. Unlike monks, the Jesuits would not flee the world to find God in the solitude and silence of a monastery. They believed that God was present everywhere in the world, and they would work where people were, largely in cities and towns, but also in far-flung missions around the world. They would labor as teachers, preachers, and in many other roles, wherever the needs were greatest.

      Formally approved by Pope Paul III in 1540, the Society of Jesus made Rome its headquarters. Ignatius soon became the head of the new order, and devoted himself to its direction. He was the principal author of the Jesuit Constitutions; he responded to requests for Jesuits from bishops, princes, city governments, and others seeking their help. From the later 1540s, requests for Jesuit teachers and for the Jesuits to found or take over schools became more and more frequent. Soon there were many Jesuit educational institutions, ranging in level from what we call middle school, to universities with graduate and professional programs.

      One particular means Ignatius and his first companions used to help others in their relationship with God was what Ignatius called Spiritual Exercises. These exercises—even today central to Jesuit ministries—were designed to help people focus on the many gifts and graces they had received from God, and on how they could respond, in gratitude, by putting their talents to use for the greater glory of God and the good of other people. Ignatius understood the Spiritual Exercises to be especially useful in helping persons to make good decisions about the direction of their lives.

      For Ignatius, prayer had a strong visual component. To help others to meditate on the meaning of the life of Jesus, Ignatius invited those doing the Exercises to imagine what a given gospel story looked like. By such “compositions of place” one could best enter into contemplation. As the Jesuit order grew, its churches also fully developed the place of the visual dimension of religious experience. Jesuit churches in Rome set a high standard for Jesuit churches throughout the world. Architecture, painting, and sculpture would work together with preaching and liturgical services to draw people closer to God.

     Like Ignatius of Loyola, FRANCIS XAVIER was born in the Basque region of northern Spain. In 1525 Francis went to Paris for a university education. From 1529 he shared a room with Peter Faber and Ignatius; under the direction of the latter, Francis did the Spiritual Exercises and became an enthusiastic participant in developing an idea for a new society devoted to service of God, wherever the need was greatest. He was ordained a priest in Venice, in 1537. Very shortly after papal approval of the Society of Jesus, Francis Xavier went from Rome to Lisbon to fulfill a request from John III, King of Portugal, who wanted missionaries to send to India. Thus Francis left Lisbon in April 1541, never to return to Europe. After more than a year’s journey he arrived in the Indian city of Goa; by 1546 he was in present-day Indonesia; in 1549 he moved on to Japan; and on December 3, 1552, he died while on route to China.

      Xavier had frequently sent letters to Ignatius and others. This correspondence, some of which was published, helped to create much interest in Francis, especially after his death. On March 12, 1622, he was canonized as a saint, by Pope Gregory XV. (Four others were canonized at the same ceremony, including Ignatius, and Teresa of Ávila, the great mystic and reformer of the Carmelite order.) More than Saint Ignatius, Saint Francis Xavier became the object of a popular cult, not only in places where Jesuits went, but also more broadly among Catholics throughout Europe and beyond. Many miracles were said to be due to the intercession of Francis Xavier; he became a favored intercessor in time of plague and other epidemic disease, and at the hour of death.

     PETER FABER was born in 1506 in Savoy, then an independent duchy, and then as now a French-speaking region nestled in the Alps between Italy and France. Like Loyola and Xavier, he went to Paris for an education. There, he shared a room with Francis Xavier, and these two were later joined by Ignatius of Loyola. Faber was a better student than Loyola, and the former tutored the latter. But Ignatius was far more mature in years and in his own spiritual journey; Faber was one of those Ignatius first led in the Spiritual Exercises. Peter Faber was ordained a priest on May 30, 1534; on August 15th of that year he joined Ignatius and five other fellow students in taking a vow of availability for ministry, wherever the need was greatest. Faber then traveled to Venice and eventually to Rome, where these first Jesuits sought papal approval of their society. Mobility characterized Faber's work: in Italy, Germany, Spain, and Portugal, as a teacher, preacher, and spiritual director. He taught theology at universities in Rome and in Mainz. Pope Paul III appointed Faber a theologian for the Council of Trent, but Faber died in Rome on August 1, 1546, before reaching Trent. He was beatified (declared Blessed) in 1872.