Book: The Jesuits and Globalization

The Jesuits and Globalization. Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges by Thomas Banchoff and Jose Casanova (editors) Georgetown University Press.

Since its foundation in the 16th century, the Society of Jesus has embarked on a mission of global significance in a pioneering and influential way.

Its 'way of proceeding' encompassed flexibility to times, places and circumstances, to the extent of appreciating the more positive aspects of the cultures Jesuits encountered and using them to impart the Gospel in a way which could be understood by the people.

In this erudite collection, the authors claim that the Jesuits more than anyone contributed to global connectivity and became cultural and political players across the world.

However, this influence was not without its costs in as much as the Society was eventually expelled from every Catholic kingdom and formally suppressed by the Pope in 1773.

Once re-established in 1814, the Jesuit influence by way of missions and educational enterprises reaffirmed their global missionary interests. This was especially true in the United States, but also worldwide, in a network of colleges, schools and corporal works of mercy.

Allied to these missions was a strong line defending the Papacy as well as opposing emerging secular and liberal thought in Europe and Latin America but this led to more expulsions.

These days the Jesuit commitment to missions with a global reach is articulated in the promotion of justice and the service of faith as a universal common good. The current Pope seeks new ways of evangelisation involving the poor and marginalised, education, missions and fraternal links.

In a series of scholarly piece mostly by Jesuits, the editors have compiled a wide range of most interesting essays on various Jesuit themes.

The book is in two parts: historical perspective and contemporary challenges. The first part considers Jesuits is East Asian their influence on Modernity, relations with Muslims, Anti-Jesuitism, education and globalisation. Part II on Contemporary Challenges looks at the Second Vatican Council and the Jesuits, social justice in Latin America, refugees, higher education and ends with globalization through a Jesuit prism.

Since the book contains collections of essays largely by Jesuits the themes of refugees, mission and education feature largely in their writings and provide a most useful history of the development of these and related fields.

Part of the appeal of this collection of essays is the link forged and argued for between the foundations of the Society of Jesus and its early missionary enterprises with their international outlook and reach which was present from its inception, and the emergence of 'globalization' as a phenomenon which has gained traction in recent years.

This has positioned the Jesuits first of all as progenitors in a global perspective in a central and powerful way when they began their missions, and laterally as becoming somewhat peripheral and offering accompaniment to the poor.

This latter has had an effect of many Jesuit institutions which now contain mandates in their constitutions and policies which require attention to the poor as part of, say, university education in that country.

The inter-connectedness of the world and the Jesuit concern with souls (that is, the whole person) have their roots, as one essayist argues, in an appeal to universal human reason coming from Catholic medieval scholasticism and Renaissance humanism rather than theological arguments.

Jesuits met other cultures which they regarded as heretical but they soon learned to adapt and draw out the elements which could tie in with Catholicism.

Nowadays, this seems to be no longer as important, given the rise of religious freedom as an individual right and so conversion to the faith seems not to have the imperative as it once had.

Also, the emergence of new technologies and perpetual news cycles has connected the globe in ways that were only dreamed of before, mostly in science fiction.

The editors seek to glean lessons from all this to include the Jesuit contribution to globalization and the globalization's debt to the Jesuits.

The availability of Jesuits for mission all over the world and the open, contingent and historical processes now unfolding, gives Jesuits an ability for adaptation to times, places and circumstances which the Society has always had as a foundational characteristic.

The writers argue that although the Society no longer has the institutional influence it once had, at least in some countries, its venerable way of proceeding ensures that it will influence the lives of many peoples in pursuit of its now re-articulated mission.