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In this letter, Ignatius replies to a number of questions from Antonio Brandão, a Portuguese scholastic who had accompanied Simão Rodrigues to Rome. The original questions dealt with practical questions, some of which Ignatius addresses at the end of the letter by simply noting that they “are more dependent on circumstances.” Of note is Ignatius’s […]

The letter below serves as one of the fullest outlines of the overall apostolic activity of the Jesuits in a city. The instructions come in three parts. First, the letter stresses how each member “provides the foundation for the others.” Virtuous behavior, right order, and using conversation and studies to draw people towards perfection were

More commonly known by its Latin name (Exposcit Debitum), the papal approval of the Formula of 1550 has articulated the purposes of the Society of Jesus since it issuance by Pope Julius III. The formula was based on the Five Chapters of 1539 and of the Formula of 1540. For more on the history, content,

William IV, duke of Bavaria, appealed to Pope Paul III and to Ignatius to send several Jesuits as professors of theology to the University of Ingolstadt, an institution that had fallen into severe decline. Alfonso Salmerón, Claude Jay, and Pierre Canisius were chosen for the task. For them, Ignatius writes the following instruction, urging them

A college in Padua was insufficiently supported by its founder, Andrea Lippomani. Lippomani had hosted Jesuit scholastics in Padua as early as 1542. The Venetian government, though, stalled negotiations to transfer Lippomani’s bequest to the Society intended to support a college in the city, doing so despite a bull by Pope Paul III in support

Ignatius addressed this “Letter of Perfection” to the flourishing scholasticate at Coimbra, in Portugal. Though the scholasticate prospered with vocations and zeal, the latter was at times quite indiscreet. Concerned observers felt that Simão Rodrigues, the Portuguese provincial, was too compliant in allowing the scholastics to become “fools for Christ,” in such manifestations as self-flagellation and

King John III of Portugal was the early Society of Jesus’s strongest royal supporter. All the more painful to the Society, then, was a serious quarrel that broke out between the Portuguese king and Pope Paul III after the latter appointed the former ambassador of Portugal as a cardinal. The king responded by recalling his ambassador

The following text is the “Formula of the Institute” composed by St. Ignatius and his first companions in 1539 as a kind of charter or mission statement for the new Society of Jesus. It was inserted with minor revisions into the 1540 bull Regimini militantis Ecclesiae, in which Pope Paul III formally approved the foundation

Subsequent to their initial deliberations during Lent in 1539, the eleven men determined their religious order would include a vow of obedience. They offered their shared intentions to enter that organization by signing the following vow of obedience, if, the vow notes, the group “will be confirmed by the pope.” Papal approval for the Society

Just before Easter in the spring of 1539, Ignatius and his companions gathered to determine whether or not they should continue to informally collaborate with one another, as they had for some five years. Their deliberations took the form of group discernment, consisting of several days of prayer and discussions. Jean Codure or Pierre Favre later