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Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished: the Society of Jesus Suppressed John W Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education Volume 45 Article 3 April 2014 Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished: The Society of Jesus Suppressed John W. Padberg S.J. Follow this and additional works at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations Recommended Citation Padberg, John W. S.J. (2014) "Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished: The ocS iety of Jesus Suppressed," Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education: Vol. 45, Article 3. Available at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol45/iss1/3 00621_conversations #26 12/13/13 5:37 PM Page 2 Padberg: Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished: The Society of Jesu Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished n the early whatsoever land they exist…as well evening of August as its statutes, usages, customs, 16, 1773, a papal decrees and Constitutions, and we The Society functionary along declare perpetually abolished and with a small entirely extinguished all authority of group of soldiers the superior general and of provin- of Jesus came to the Jesuit cial superiors and visitors and any Curia in Rome. and all superiors in the afore-men- They summoned tioned Society….” Some days later Suppressed Father General Father Ricci and his assistants were Lorenzo Ricci and his assistants and imprisoned in Castel Sant’Angelo. By John W. Padberg, S.J. presented to Ricci a document enti- After two years of strict confinement tled “Dominus ac Redemptor” (“Our there deprived of enough food, Lord and Redeemer”) from Pope heat, and light, Ricci died a papal OClement XIV. In it, in the words of prisoner on November 24, 1775. the document itself, the pope said that “in the fullness of apostolic power we put out of existence and John W. Padberg, S.J., is the director suppress the Society of Jesus; we do the Institute of Jesuit Sources in St. away with and abrogate each and Louis; he is a writer and lecturer every one of its offices, ministries, particularly on Jesuit history, works, houses, schools, colleges…in spirituality, and governance. 2 Conversations Published by e-Publications@Marquette, 2014 1 00621_conversations #26 12/13/13 5:37 PM Page 3 Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education, Vol. 45, Iss. 1 [2014], Art. 3 Thus did the supposedly universal suppression of the include hints of schism if he did not suppress the Society Society of Jesus take place. universally. Unable to stand up to the pressure of the But the piecemeal extinction of the Society had Bourbon courts, Clement finally did so. begun previously over a period of 14 years before 1773. The apostolic works of the Society of Jesus around For decades the Society had been the bête-noir of sever- the world were destroyed. Their schools (more than 700 al quite hostile groups. They included, first, the of them) were closed. Their libraries were either confis- Jansenists in their rigorist interpretation of Christian life cated or trashed. Their churches were turned over to and, on the other hand, many so-called “philosophes,” others. Their overseas missions were ruined. More than the deistic or materialistic thinkers of the 18th century 22,000 Jesuits were no longer such. In most circum- French Enlightenment who saw the Jesuits as defenders stances individual ex-Jesuits had to make their own way, of an obscurantist church. Second, there were national with the exception of the work of one young Spaniard, governments intent on their supremacy in church-state Joseph Pignatelli. Over the long, long years of the sup- relationships. Third, there were some powerful enemies pression he effectively kept united at least in mutual in Rome who opposed a variety of Jesuit theological support a great portion of the Spanish former Jesuits. opinions and pastoral practices in Europe and Jesuit For the suppression to take effect canonically, attempts in foreign mission lands to present the faith in “Dominus ac Redemptor” had to be promulgated by the a way consonant with the social and cultural concepts bishop of each diocese in which a Jesuit community was and structures of the peoples of those lands. located. This circumstance kept a remnant alive in one The destruction began in 1759 in Portugal, where place, Russia, contrary to the expectations of everyone, the government had been determined to bend the because the document was not promulgated there. Church to its will. For years its leader, Pombal, had Now onto the stage of this drama came an act with waged an unremitting pamphlet war of slander against a whole new cast of characters. It included two popes, the Jesuits, seen as defenders of the papacy. Finally, they both favorable to the Jesuits but constrained by the were packed into ships and unceremoniously dumped intransigence of Spain and France, an ambitious arch- on the territory of the Papal States. From the missions in bishop, a puzzled superior, a supposedly amused king, Brazil they were shipped back, many of them to rot in and, most importantly, a ruler who tolerated no opposi- Lisbon dungeons for years. tion. It was a serious drama with touches of what was In France in 1762 the ardently Gallican Parisian almost comedy. Parlement, which had been for almost 200 years anti- To start with the popes, Pius VI had been elected Jesuit, decreed the dissolution of the Society of Jesus after Clement XIV died in 1774. He reigned until 1799, there. As its decree went on page after page, the Society one of the longest papacies and one in its last ten years was guilty, among other crimes, of “simony, blasphemy, burdened with the antireligious events of the French sacrilege, magic, witchcraft, astrology, idolatry, supersti- Revolution. He and his successor, Pius VII, pope from tion, immodesty, theft, parricide, homicide, suicide and 1800 to 1823, were each for some time imprisoned by regicide…blaspheming the Blessed Virgin Mary…destruc- the revolutionaries and Napoleon. Pius VII wanted to tive of the divinity of Jesus Christ…teaching men to live as restore the Society, but in the turmoil of the time he beasts and Christians to live as pagans.” If so, the Jesuits could not do so. were certainly busy. The archbishop was Stanislaw Siestrzencewicz, a In 1767 in Spain, King Charles III, influenced espe- convert to Catholicism, auxiliary bishop of Vilna and cially by his regalist government ministers to fear the soon to be elevated to a much higher post. Jesuits, banished them from Spain and all of its posses- The puzzled superior was Fr. Stanislaw Czerniewicz, sions, including most of Latin America. Within three designated vice-provincial of the Jesuits in the part of days, in Spain itself in March-April 1767, 2700 Jesuits Poland that Catherine had taken in the first partition of were forced out onto the roads to its port cities thence the country, apportioned to Prussia, Austria, and Russia to be shipped and dumped on the Papal States. in 1772, one year before the suppression of the Society. On February 2, 1769, Pope Clement XIII, a staunch Most importantly, the person who brooked no defender of the Society of Jesus through all those years, opposition and who set all these characters into interac- died. After a conclave of several months, with the gov- tion was Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia, who ernments of Spain, France, and Portugal alternately willed the suppressed Society into continued existence threatening and bribing the participants, finally Cardinal in her recently acquired former Polish lands. Lorenzo Ganganelli was elected as Pope Clement XIV. When the first partition of Poland took place in Then began four years of incessant harassment and bul- 1772, Russia acquired territory that had a large Catholic lying of the pope by the Spanish and French ambassa- population of about 900,000 and also 201 Jesuits in a dors to the Holy See. The threats went so far as to variety of residences and schools, 18 communities in all. Conversations 3 http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol45/iss1/3 2 00621_conversations #26 12/13/13 5:37 PM Page 4 Padberg: Perpetually Abolished, Entirely Extinguished: The Society of Jesu Catherine wanted to maintain the good will of her new Then between 1780 and 1783 three events assured Catholic subjects and to maintain the Jesuit schools, the existence and growth of this remnant. A Jesuit novi- which were by far the best in all her lands. Typical of tiate opened; a vicar general was elected; and the pope Catherine, she had decided to organize on her own the gave verbal but nonetheless explicit approval of who Roman Catholic Church in Russia. So in December 1772, these men were and what they were doing, at least in she decreed that a Latin diocese for the whole country Russia. Already in 1779 Catherine had agreed to such a be set up at Mogilev. She named Siestrzencewicz as novitiate. Then she agreed that the Jesuits in Russia bishop. All of this she did without the least consultation could call a general congregation to elect a superior. In with Rome. The land was hers, she was the ruler, and 1782 it chose Czerniewicz. Catherine finally sent an her decisions were law. envoy to Rome to regularize her arrangements for all Frederick the Great of Prussia also kept the Jesuits Latin Rite Catholics in Russia, to approve the Jesuit novi- in existence but only for a few years. To him is attrib- tiate, and indirectly to approve the election of uted the remark that while the Society of Jesus was Czerniewicz. The pope could not at all give that last destroyed by “their Most Catholic, Most Christian, and approval formally in writing, but publicly in the pres- Most Faithful Majesties” [of Spain, France, and Portugal], ence of witnesses three times he repeated “Approbo” (“I it was preserved by “his Most Heretical Majesty” and “her approve.) So, just ten years after the universal suppres- Most Schismatical Majesty.” sion, the Jesuits in Russia now had a definitive sign that When “Dominus ac Redemptor” arrived in Russia in they were still in existence, if only there.
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