Jesuit order

S.J. - Societas Jesu = Jesus' Society. It was the most influential monastic order of the Catholic reform. The Jesuit order was founded by a Spanish soldier, St Ignace of Loyola (1491-1556), in 1540. The founder defined the responsibilities of the order only broadly: old and modern ways (for example, spiritual practices, folk missions) of pasturing, spreading the faith outside Europe, defending the religion from the Protestants, taking part in middle and higher education as professionals, cultivating different ecclesiastic and secular sciences. The structure of the Jesuit order was centralised, its programme was multi-fold, its members were well trained and they could be mobilised for any kind of task, as the best ones took a fourth oath besides the usual three monastic oaths (poverty, cleanness and obedience), and this was unconditional obedience to the Pope in any mission. These characteristic features made the order the elite group of the renewed Catholic church in the 16-17th centuries. This played a great role in the fact that Catholic reform was successful against the Reformation. By the 18th century the order had numerous enemies in western Europe because of their financial and political power. Due to the strong political pressure Pope Clement XIV (1769-1774) dissolved it in 1773, and it was reorganised only in 1814. In Hungary after some experiments in the 16th century the order started to expand quickly from the beginning of the 17th century, and soon it became the most powerful tool of Catholic reform and counter-reformation. It had a major role in organising schools, pasturing and converting activities, theological debates as well as in literature and science. When the order was dissolved (1773) there were 838 Jesuits in 44 convents in Hungary. They settled again in the country in 1854, and played an important role in secondary education and organising the Catholic press right until 1950. They have officially been functioning again since 1989.

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