Early Modern Jesuits between obedience and conscience during the generalate of Claudio Acquaviva (1581-1615). Preface by Flavio Rurale
(2014) ISBN: [978-1-4094-5706-0], 200 pages, published
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- Five important features of the book. • From an historiographical point of view, this book takes into consideration diverse historiographical traditions that have evolved over the last two decades, especially in Italy and France on the one hand and in the English speaking community on the other, in relation to the history of the Society of Jesus, thus creating a new perspective on civic society and power in Europe at the time of the Ancien Régime. • Early modern religious Obedience’s issues in Western Europe are analysed in a double perspective: inside and outside the Society of Jesus. The Ignatian sources about obedience (Constitutions, Spiritual Exercises, Autobiography, Spiritual Diary and Letters) and their interpretations become the starting point to analyse complementary hierarchies of Obedience (to the conscience and/or to different and conflicting authorities). [student course use: Church History and Early modern Political Thought] • A corpus of heterogeneous sources allows the reader to appreciate the multiplicity and ambiguity of Jesuit speeches about Obedience: from theological and political perspective to popular pastoral care (catechisms). [Student course use: Early modern political and social History. Especially Ch. 1] • Key-Jesuit attitudes as “accommodatio” and “representar” are integrated into the system of government of souls and bodies, allowing to integrate missionary practices from a renovated anthropological and theological point of view. [student course use : Global History of religious Missions] • A gendered analysis of meaningful cases of spiritual direction by Jesuits to mystic women, adds new interpretations about self-conscience as licit authorities in the decisional process. [Student course use: Early Modern Gender Studies. Especially Ch. 4] This book seeks to contextualise the debates concerning obedience that took place amongst the Jesuits of south-western Europe during the generalate of Claudio Acquaviva (1581–1615). Acquaviva’s generalate marked a period of significant redefinition for the Ignatian institute during which the Society’s system of government was called into doubt. The need for obedience and the limits of that obedience posed a question of fundamental importance to debates taking place within the Society, and to the definition of a collective Jesuit identity. At the same time, struggles for jurisdiction between political states and the papacy, as well as the difficulties raised by the Protestant Reformation, all called for matters to be rethought. Obedience was reconsidered in anthropological, theological and political terms in an attempt to integrate the various demands it placed upon subjects within a hierarchical system that was still in the midst of being redefined. Several Jesuits took part in this debate over obedience. Moreover, by this period the individual’s own conscience was emerging as a new authority that was demanding its own jurisdiction. Moulded, controlled and heard in the on-going work of the Spiritual Exercises, a person’s own conscience became an essential part in negotiations between external authorities and the individual. Thus Jesuit obedience should be taken into account as a theory and topic of discussion that is able to cut across matters both within and outside the Society, thus transforming itself into an object of cultural narration. Drawing on new research and some previously-published material, each chapter examines archival sources and contemporary printed books aimed at various audiences. The Jesuit authors whose texts are considered formed part of the elite of the Catholic reconquest of their day, or were involved in affairs at the highest level during the generalate of Acquaviva. Given this context, the book pays special attention to the importance of gender relations and the theoretical and social consequences these had. In particular, the book explores several examples of Jesuits offering spiritual direction to mystic women, as well as
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Mostaccio, S. (2014). Early Modern Jesuits between obedience and conscience during the generalate of Claudio Acquaviva (1581-1615). Preface by Flavio Rurale. Ashgate. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/160243