Jesuits: A Multibiography - Hardcover

Lacouture, Jean

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1887178058 ISBN 13: 9781887178051

Publisher: Counterpoint, 1995

Synopsis

Portrays the history of the Jesuits in relation to world events of the past five centuries, describing how the Society of Jesus came to be the most powerful Christian religious order

About this title

Language Notes:

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French

Review:

Jesuits: A Multibiography is history meticulously reconstructed and eminently readable, history that comes to life through human faces. Carefully translated from the original French by Jeremy Leggatt, Jesuits: A Multibiography is a narrative history of the famous "Society of Jesus" of the Roman Catholic church. The Jesuits have been players in the most important cultural, political, and intellectual debates for the past 500 years. Jean Lacouture has written an engaging "multibiography" of the startling and contradictory individuals who became the leaders of the Society of jesus as it grew to become the most power order in Christendom. Lacouture's fluent use of diaries, letters, and memoirs weaves together blazing portraits of Ignatius of Loyola and the first founders of the order. Lacouture traces the growth of the Order through to its most recent leaders, Pedro Arrupe and Peter Hans Kolvenbach, and looks squarely at the Order's many tensions with the Vatican in the last 40 years. Lacouture portrays the Jesuits as progressives, as "global humanists", bringing the teachings of Christ to the secular world. Lacoutre explores their work in China, Japan, Vietnam, India, Paraguay and Brazil. The Jesuits' attempt to establish a sister order of nuns (and the priests and women involved) also receives a fascinating discussion. The Jesuits have been so influential that they are among the key architects of modern thought. Jesuits: A Multibiography is a fascinating reader for all students of Western culture and Church history. -- Midwest Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Counterpoint
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 1887178058
• ISBN 13: 9781887178051
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 550