Introduction

Dear Readers, we present you with a special volume of the Ignatianum Philosophical Yearbook, largely devoted to the historical significance of the Jesuit Order. We are offering it to you at a special time – the Ignatian Year, announced to be celebrated worldwide a few months ago by Father General Arturo Sosa S.J., to honor the 500th anniversary of the conversion of Ignatius Loyola (May 20, 1521) and the 400th anniversary of his canonization (March 12, 1621). As we all know, anniversaries of important events and related celebrations are an opportunity to reminisce, remind, and make inventories. Such is the case with the present volume, part of the Ignatian Year celebrations, in which we have included a number of scholarly treatises on Jesuit activity.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s Phenomenology of the Noosphere

Although Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) was thoroughly trained in philosophy and theology, he was first and foremost a paleoanthropologist, directly involved in the discovery of Homo erectus pekinensis (“Sinanthropus”) in China in the 1920s and 1930s. He came from a Catholic aristocratic background, was ordained a priest in 1911, survived World War I (as a stretcher-bearer, distinguished with the Legion of Honour), joined the Jesuit Order, conducted paleoanthropological field work during the interbellum, and became entangled in a conflict with his Jesuit superiors (over pantheism and the concept of original sin) until his death in New York (in exile more or less). When his writings were published (shortly after his death, as his superiors forbade publication during his lifetime), he quickly became an intellectual celebrity. Currently, he is credited with having anticipated Gaia theory (King, 2006), the global village concept (McLuhan, 1962), the Internet (Barlow, 1992; Cobb, 1998), the WWW (Garreau, 2005, p. 256; Greenfield, 2014, p. 9), transhumanism (Delio, 2014; Steinhart, 2008), the “global brain” (Stock, 1993), and the Anthropocene (e.g. Crutzen, 2002; Steffen et al., 2011).

Pedagogical Ideas and Practices of the Jesuits of The Late Middle Ages (XV–XVII Centuries)

The article examines the pedagogical activity of the Jesuits at the first stage of the development of the Order of St. Loyola. The Jesuit Order intended to monopolize the education and training of the young generations of the ruling strata. The Jesuits were looking for a “third way” between the formulas of Roman Catholic pedagogy and secular approaches to education and training. The congregation of Jesuits used the ideological pedagogical potential of the Renaissance and the Reformation, interpreting it from a conservative standpoint. The article examines the activities of Jesuit colleges: management, programs, methods of teaching and upbringing. A number of European thinkers of the XVI-XVII centuries. positively assessed the pedagogical activity of the Order of St. Loyola. Criticism of Jesuit pedagogy grew. A number of researchers find a lot of positive things in this pedagogy.

Mathematicians and Mathematics at Prague University during the Second Half of the 18th Century

The paper describes the situation of teaching mathematics and its position at Prague University in the second half of the 18th century. In order to be able to adequately present the specific changes during this period, I first explain the development of the role of mathematics as a modern science among the Prague Jesuits in the two centuries before. It is pointed out that the Jesuits initially assigned only a very minor importance to mathematics. From the middle of the 17th century, however, there was significant development. In the middle of the 18th century, under the influence of the Enlightenment, state reforms set in, which also significantly influenced the structure and content of education at Prague University. I describe the consequences of these reforms – that also led to the dissolution of the Jesuit Order – for mathematics. Finally, I deal with the life and work of mathematicians and astronomers at Prague University in the second half of the 18th century.

Jesuits in Colonial Latin America

The Jesuits have impacted the history of colonial Latin America as have few other religious orders. Founded in 1540 by Ignatius of Loyola and a group of companions, the Society of Jesus defined its profile from the beginning as an order devoted to apostolic activity, especially through missions, and education, which led it to promote new forms of preaching and teaching. Its expansion in the world coincides with the Catholic Counter-Reformation fostered by the Council of Trent (1545–1563), in which the Jesuits had a decisive participation. The growth and expansion of the order in Latin America was rapid and continuous. The first Jesuits arrived in Brazil in 1549, in Peru in 1568, and in Mexico in 1572, and they soon became involved in the main religious, social, economic, and political activities of each region. They founded numerous colleges and residences in the most important cities and dozens of missions, or reducciones, villages among the indigenous populations living on the so-called borderlands of the colonial domains of Spain and Portugal. The several Jesuit establishments in Latin America were territorially organized into provinces, which maintained constant and fluid communication with the headquarters of the order in Rome, where its highest authority, the superior general, resided. Demands by local governments, an increase in the number of operarios, and an expansion of the political and ecclesiastical jurisdictions led to the establishment of new Jesuit provinces in the 17th century, most especially that of Paraguay, which became one of the most famous in Latin America. Each province was staffed by both priests and coadjutor brothers (lay Jesuits who had not completed their training) from different European countries, mainly Spain, as well as Creoles and mestizos born in America. Both internally and externally, the writing of documents of different types served as a central instrument of communication and government of the various Jesuit establishments. This abundance of documents produced is why the corpus of research of the Jesuit order in Latin America is profuse.

Kasper Cichocki (1545–1616) — A Catholic polemicist from Tarnów

The article constitutes a biography of a religious writer, born in Tarnów, educated at the universities in Cracow, Italy and Germany, a scholar and clergyman. He attained certain ecclesiastical dignities (the canon of Wilno and Sandomierz, the parson of three parishes), however, first and foremost, he achieved fame and recognition as the writer of two Latin texts. Both texts were created in defence of the Jesuit Order, at that time greatly attacked because of their uncompromising nature in fighting against the Protestants residing in Poland. In particular, the second text of Kasper Cichocki, “Alloquiorum Osieciensium”, became widely known in Poland as well as in Europe. Due to the fact that the text targeted the then reigning king of England and Scotland, James I Stuart, it met with acute diplomatic opposition from the court of London, who demanded a severe punishment for the author and a public burning of his work.

Słowiańszczyzna w ideach rosyjskich jezuitów w dziewiętnastowiecznej Francji

Gdy sięgamy po historię rosyjskiej literatury i myśli społecznej w dziewiętnastym wieku, jawi się nam ona w postaci dwóch nurtów: okcydentalistycznego i słowianofilskiego. Rosyjscy katolicy, jak dotąd, byli uznawani za przedstawicieli pierwszego z nich z uwagi na ich pozytywny stosunek do Europy Zachodniej i jej religii. W centrum uwagi niniejszego artykułu znaleźli się czterej emigranci żyjący na stałe we Francji i należący do zakonu jezuitów – Iwan Gagarin, Iwan Martynow, Jewgienij Bałabin oraz Paweł Pierling. Postrzeganie przez nich kwestii Słowian i Słowiańszczyzny oraz jej problemów religijnych pozwala umiejscowić ich idee względem poglądów słowianofilów i okcydentalistów. Rosyjscy katolicy nie negują ani wpływów na Rosję innych kultur słowiańskich i szeroko pojętego prawosławia, ani dorobku kulturowego zachodniej Europy. Staroruska przeszłość jest powodem do dumy i przekonania o wartości narodowej kultury Rosji. Z kolei w przeciwieństwie do słowianofilów proponują oni Rosji zostanie potęgą katolicką i wypełnienie wielkiej misji cywilizacyjnej wobec Zachodu. Artykuł mówi o rosyjskim katolicyzmie jako o trzeciej drodze w rosyjskiej kulturze badanego okresu, która ma wiele punktów stycznych z obu wymienionymi nurtami, jednakże z żadnym z nich w pełni się nie pokrywa. Slavicity in the Ideas of Russian Jesuits in 19th Century France When analysing Russian literature and social thought of the nineteenth century, it can be easily observed that the works can manifest one of two tendencies prevalent in those times: Occidental or Slavophil one. Russian Catholics have been so far recognised as the representatives of the former because of their positive attitude towards Western Europe and its religion. The focus of this article is on the four immigrants permanently living in France, members of the Jesuit Order – Ivan Gagarin, Ivan Martynov, Yevgeniy Balabin and Paweł Pierling. Their perception of Slavic matters, the Slavs and their religious problems allows them to locate their ideas in relation to the views of Slavophiles and Occidentalists. Russian Catholics do not deny the influence of other Slavic cultures and broadly understood Orthodoxy on Russia, or the cultural heritage of Western Europe – the Old Russian past is a reason for pride and belief in the significant importance of Russia’s national culture. Contrary to the Slavophiles, they propose that Russia should become Catholic power to fulfil a great civilisational mission towards the West. The article discusses Russian Catholicism as the third trend in the Russian culture of the analysed period, which is closely related to the aforementioned tendencies but it does not fully overlap with any of them.

Salus populi: Icons and the Protection of the People

With the outbreak of the COVID-19 global pandemic, Pope Francis prayed before an icon of the Virgin and Child in Santa Maria Maggiore and a crucifix in San Marcello, two images associated with miraculous healing and intercessory power. He subsequently had the icon and crucifix moved to St. Peter’s where they flanked the pope as he offered a special Urbi et Orbi blessing on March 27, 2020. To contextualize Francis’s use of an icon during the coronavirus outbreak, this article will trace the role of cult images in Rome during occurrences of disease and will briefly discuss the specific importance of the Santa Maria Maggiore icon for the early Jesuit order.

Manly Missions

This chapter explores the European origins of missionary masculinity and the affective reasons behind the phenomenal growth of the Jesuit order. It pays particular attention to the reimagined clerical masculinity that the founding father Ignatius of Loyola modeled for and generated in other men across Europe, notably in German lands. Two media of male mimesis are especially relevant: Ignatius’s so-called Autobiography and his Spiritual Exercises. Ignatian manhood lent itself to participation in European expansion due to its global orientation, high mobility, and emphasis on patri-filial ties. Jesuit masculinity made ample room for the feminine on the level of the symbolic and the affective but established firm boundaries with actual women through women’s de jure exclusion from the all-male Society of Jesus.

Bartolomeo Ammannati

Bartolomeo Ammannati [Ammanati] (b. 1511–d. 1592) was a prominent sculptor and architect working in Florence in the mid- to late 16th century. He is considered a key figure of the Italian Mannerist period. One of many artists working in the wake of Michelangelo Buonarroti, Ammannati began as a pupil of Baccio Bandinelli before working under Jacopo Sansovino and Giovanni Angelo Montorsoli. Ammannati developed a style that drew on the dynamic compositions of Michelangelo but one that was tempered with a sense of restraint and an ability to engage bold classical forms and details. In the 1530s and 1540s, Ammannati worked on significant projects, such as Sansovino’s Biblioteca Marciana in Venice and Montorsoli’s tomb for the poet Jacopo Sannazaro installed in Naples. However, he encountered a frustrating setback when his tomb for the soldier Mario Nari in SS. Annunziata in Florence was criticized and taken down amidst religious objections. Between 1544 and 1548, Ammannati created remarkable sculptural and architectural ensembles in Padua for humanist and antiquarian Marco Mantua Benavides, including a triumphal arch, statues of Jupiter and Apollo and a colossus of Hercules, whose towering twenty-nine-foot figure was reproduced on a print by Enea Vico and Antonio Lafreri (1553). Ammannati’s tomb for Benavides in the Church of the Eremitani is celebrated for its sculptural and architectural balance, illustrating his take on Michelangelo’s unfinished wall tombs in the Medici Chapel. In 1550, Ammannati married Laura Battiferra of Urbino, an accomplished poet and a prominent figure in the devotional culture of Counter-Reformation Italy. He traveled to Rome where he undertook important commissions related to the papal family, including tombs for the Del Monte in S. Pietro in Montorio and portions of Julius III’s Villa Giulia, on which he collaborated with Giorgio Vasari and Jacopo Vignola. Ammannati’s elegant and whimsical Nymphaeum for the Villa Giulia showcases his developing architectural style. In 1555, Ammannati returned to Florence to serve under Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici, where his service to this family would mark the height of his career and see the full maturity of his style. His works exemplify Mannerism at its height, from the artfully elongated bronzes of the Neptune Fountain to the playful rustication of the Palazzo Pitti courtyard. His numerous fountains present splendid and witty tableaux, and his bronze Ops for the Studiolo of Francesco de’ Medici stands out for its grace and refinement. As architect and engineer, he was responsible for landmarks such as the Ponte Santa Trinità and the Column of Justice, and he oversaw construction materials for the Cathedral and the Uffizi. In his later years, Ammannati took on architectural projects outside of Florence and he grew increasingly dedicated to the Jesuit order and the concerns of the Counter Reformation, even condemning the display of nudity in his own work in 1582. He and Laura left their possessions to the Jesuits and helped with the reconstruction of the church of S. Giovannino in Florence, funding a chapel where they were buried.