Jesuits are members of the Society of Jesus. Currently, about 14,000 Jesuits (priests, brothers and men in formation) serve in ministries around the world.
The Society of Jesus is the largest men’s religious order in the Roman Catholic Church. The Society is especially available for missions from the pope.
Jesuit formation aims to develop the potential of the whole person — body, mind and spirit — for the universal mission of the Society and at the service of the church. Hence the formation program spends long periods of time in prayer, spirituality, personal development, intellectual development, cultural and media sensitivity, and insertion in the developing world, leading to an availability for the Jesuit mission whose scope extends to all of the academic, cultural and spiritual disciplines throughout the entire world. Ideally, a formed Jesuit is available to be sent on any mission, and the length of formation is to prepare this flexibility.
Jesuits can choose to be priests or brothers. Both groups of men take the same vows and live and pray in a religious community. Priests are ordained and administer the sacraments and celebrate Mass. Although brothers do not feel called to the life of a priest, they participate fully in the work of the Society of Jesus.
The Jesuit brother is a man called by God to the apostolic and missionary work of the church. He is a man who consecrates the labor of his hands, all his talents, all his life, to the service of God and his neighbor.
When Ignatius and his companions discerned how they were to live their vocation, their experience was already linked to the exercise of priestly ministry. But the required mobility to live out the vocation led Ignatius to accept into the Society a diversity of priests and brothers to share the same vocation and contribute to the one mission. All members are graced with the call to follow Jesus poor and humble.
The brother’s vocation is to be sent to labor strenuously in giving aid towards the salvation and perfection of the souls of others. Brothers share in and contribute to the one apostolic vocation through the personal call of the Spirit. They can function in any mission proper to the Society. Brothers are intimately involved in every apostolic task of the Society through which this mission is carried out.
Thus, the first and most important contribution of a brother is the gift of his own self, offered freely in service to the Lord.
Pastors of Catholic parishes can be diocesan priests or members of religious orders such as the Jesuits. All parishes are part of the local diocesan system, and from time to time, archbishops or bishops invite Jesuits to staff parishes and other ministries where they believe our talents can foster growth and community.
Roman Catholic parishes are always part of a local diocese, but pastors can be either diocesan or religious priests. Diocesan priests make promises of chastity and obedience; they are under the authority of bishops. Religious belong to communities, such as the Society of Jesus, which are typically guided by a particular mission or spiritual tradition.
Religious priests, including Jesuits, take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience; they are under the authority of their local superior and provincial. Jesuits take an additional vow of obedience to the pope, placing themselves at his disposal.
Jesuit provincials are appointed by the Superior General in Rome to serve six-year terms. Provincials oversee geographic units called provinces. In Canada and the United States, the Society of Jesus is organized into five provinces or geographic regions.
In Latin: Societas Jesu
In English: Society of Jesus
In French: La Compagnie de Jésus
In Spanish: Compañía de Jesús
“It is to know that one is a sinner, yet called to be a companion of Jesus, as Ignatius was, who begged the Blessed Virgin to place him with her Son, and who then saw the Father himself ask Jesus, carrying his cross, to take this pilgrim into his company.”
“It is to engage, under the standard of the cross, in the crucial struggle of our time the struggle for faith and that struggle for justice which it includes.”
– from the 32nd General Congregation Decree on “Jesuits Today”
The Jesuit takes religious vows which are apostolic. He commits himself until death to the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. This is so that he may be totally united to Christ and share his own freedom to be at the service of all God’s people. And so, the Jesuit formalizes this commitment, by public vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
In binding the Jesuits, the vows set them free:
Moreover, following Ignatius they have asked Christ our Lord to let them render this service in a manner that gives them a personality of their own. They have chosen to give it in the form of a consecrated life, placing themselves at the service not only of the local churches but of the universal church, by a special vow of obedience to his who presides over the universal church, namely, the pope.
