Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Charts
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Organizing the Society of Jesus
- 3 Decentralizing the Society of Jesus
- 4 Imagining Global Mission
- 5 Space, Time, and Truth in the Jesuit Psychology
- 6 The Missionary Motivation
- 7 The Jesuit Missionary Network
- 8 The Jesuit Financial Network
- 9 The Jesuit Information Network
- 10 The Jesuit Sacred Economy
- 11 An Edifying End: Global Salvific Catholicism
- Appendix A Abbreviations for Document Sources
- Appendix B Chronological Tables (1540–1722)
- Appendix C Principal Prosographical Information
- Appendix D Monetary Systems
- Works Cited
- Index
3 - Decentralizing the Society of Jesus
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Charts
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Organizing the Society of Jesus
- 3 Decentralizing the Society of Jesus
- 4 Imagining Global Mission
- 5 Space, Time, and Truth in the Jesuit Psychology
- 6 The Missionary Motivation
- 7 The Jesuit Missionary Network
- 8 The Jesuit Financial Network
- 9 The Jesuit Information Network
- 10 The Jesuit Sacred Economy
- 11 An Edifying End: Global Salvific Catholicism
- Appendix A Abbreviations for Document Sources
- Appendix B Chronological Tables (1540–1722)
- Appendix C Principal Prosographical Information
- Appendix D Monetary Systems
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
When I began researching this project, one expert on the Jesuits recommended that I read the Society's Constitutions, which he called the “Jesuit bible.” Although he drew this metaphor to impress upon me the Constitutions' importance, we can strengthen the comparison by emphasizing rather the complex relationship between Christians and their Bibles, which they have interpreted and then followed, adapted, or ignored in accordance with circumstance and tradition.
Jesuit ambition was global, but it ran ahead of the globalizing possibilities of the early-modern world. Many months and many miles separated missionaries from authority in Rome. Friction from the realities of communications and transportation slowed and sometimes broke – and sometimes even promoted – the global network they were building. Disagreements regarding how best to pursue the all-important mission separated Jesuits from other religious orders, and from each other.
The Difficulties of Distance
In the pre-modern world, information was less likely than other commodities to travel great distances intact. Thus Chinese silk reached the Mediterranean by at least 150 b.c., while Pliny's Natural History (a.d. 70) still described blue-eyed Chinese harvesting silk from trees. Even in the early-modern period, information remained in short supply. For news on the New World, the Roman Curia depended largely on the Spanish ambassador or on the cardinal in the consistory who cared for imperial interests.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Salvation and Globalization in the Early Jesuit Missions , pp. 45 - 67Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2008