Silvia Mostaccio

S

ilvia Mostaccio

, Early Modern Jesuits between Obedience and
Conscience during the Generalate of Claudio Acquaviva (1581–1615)

.

Preface by Flavio
Rurale

. Ashgate:
2014

1.   

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]

2.   

Key Words

Society of Jesus; Jesuits; Obedience (religious and
political); conscience; Ignatius of Loyola - Constitutions, Spiritual
Exercises, Autobiography, Spiritual Diary, Letter of obedience; Catechisms;
Holy Office; accommodation; gender and religion; Spiritual direction; Monarchomachs;
 

Claudio Acquaviva; Giovanni Botero;
Antonio Possevino; Roberto Bellarmino; Francis Coster; Thomas Sailly; Peter
Canisius; Virgilio Cepari; Sixtus V; Achille Gagliardi; Maria Maddalena de’
Pazzi; Mary Ward; Isabella Berinzaga; Catherine de Francheville.

3.   

Relating Areas

4.   

Early modern
religious history, cultural studies, obedience and hierarchies of powers,
individual conscience, Society of Jesus, new religious orders for men, gender
and religion, gender and Jesuits, spiritual direction, casuistic and probabilism,
Roman Inquisition, Claudio Acquaviva generalate, pastoral care and religious
missions.

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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
the texts and pastoral initiatives that sprung from these relationships, tying
these in to the topic of obedience.

The first
chapter offers an analysis of the texts and contexts in which Jesuits reflected
on obedience at the turn of the seventeenth century. It looks in particular at
their consideration of obedience in terms of a ‘political’ necessity both
within and outside the Society: necessary for living together in the Church and
in society at large. The chapter examines the many approaches and solutions
proposed by Jesuits according to the different social and political contexts in
which they were working and the public they were trying to reach.

The
three following chapters explore the various Ignatian sources of this period
that discussed obedience, placing them within their specific contexts. Chapter
2 lingers on the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus, comparing their
conception of obedience with that proposed by some of Ignatius’s own writings
(particularly the Récit

and Journal

) as well as with the legal
documents of other contemporary religious orders. Chapter 3 examines the famous
letter on blind obedience written by Ignatius in 1553 and addressed to his
Portuguese brothers. The letter underlines the issue of obedience in relation
to an inquisitorial power and centralised papacy set on affirming its authority
over religious orders during the pontificate of Sixtus V. Finally, Chapter 4
analyses the way in which the Spiritual Exercises were used as the preferred
means to give the individual a voice, looking at this from the perspective of
gender.