Local Jesuits celebrate 500th anniversary of order's founders
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| Jesuit Father David Fleming, a former provincial for the Jesuits of the Missouri Province, lectured about one of the order's founders, Blessed Peter Faber, March 29 at St. Patrick Church in Colorado Springs. Herald/Jim Myers |
COLORADO SPRINGS. The Society of Jesus, celebrating a jubilee year, hosted a series of Lenten lectures at St. Patrick Church discussing the Jesuit founders. The Jesuits in 2006 are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the birth of both St. Francis Xavier (April 13) and Blessed Peter Faber (April 7), as well as the 450th anniversary of the death of St. Ignatius Loyola (July 31).
Jesuit Father David Fleming, a former provincial for the Jesuits of the Missouri Province and current editor of Review for Religious, concluded the talks March 29 with a lecture focusing on Blessed Faber, the least known of the three companions who started as roommates at the University of Paris and ended up forming a strong Catholic faith society.
"Peter was one of the people that anyone could talk to. He was the companion of all the companions," said Father Fleming. Blessed Faber was beatified Sept. 5, 1872, and his feast day is Aug. 8.
Blessed Faber always strove to increase his closeness to Jesus Christ, formed in his experiences and what he learned from St. Ignatius Loyola, broken into two elements: intimacy with Jesus and service to God.
"Peter would simply say, 'To be with Jesus in order to serve,'" said Father Fleming, who has taught at St. Louis University and Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge, Mass. "Peter's first desire was for an intimacy with Christ."
Father Fleming used Blessed Faber's example to illustrate how people can develop a more intimate relationship with Christ. Relying on the Ignatian teaching on intimacy, Father Fleming talked about coming "to know Jesus with an interior knowledge so that I might love him more, and then that I might be enabled to follow him more closely."
"To know Jesus with an interior knowledge might be paraphrased as coming to know Jesus from the inside," Father Fleming said. "Jesus and his gift to us of the spirit are the ones who can enter us into this kind knowledge."
Father Fleming described what he called "a dark side" of Blessed Faber, one we all share. Blessed Faber had a difficult time discerning his vocation in his early to mid-20s, often vacillating between becoming a priest or a monk, taking on a layperson's role, or even entering into a secular vocation. He also felt unworthy of God's love, according to Father Fleming.
"For Peter … he really did not feel good about himself at all. That was a real darkness," said Father Fleming, noting that St. Ignatius Loyola would become Blessed Faber's spiritual director and would help him break through that darkness. "He does it by encouraging a relationship with Jesus Christ."
Blessed Faber developed a strong devotion to Christ and became, as Father Fleming described," roommates in more familiar ways than Peter Faber, St. Ignatius Loyola and St. Francis Xavier were roommates."
"Peter became so in touch with Jesus that even his feelings could be measured against the feelings of Jesus," said Father Fleming. "Peter found his experiences more and more modeled on the experiences of Jesus himself, and it gave him great joy that he could be so intimately connected with the person he loved: Jesus Christ."
Blessed Faber used his experiences to form a dialogue with Protestants in their early years. Through Blessed Faber traveled incessantly in his ministry, his knack for ecumenism led Pope Paul III to consider him as a papal representative to the Council of Trent (1545-1563).
"Obedience describes our most basic response to God: a listening response,'" said Father Fleming. "As one of the first Jesuit ecumenists, Peter exemplifies what it means to listen closely to another. He never condemned; he never shouted at (Protestants). He listened."
Before making the trip to Trent, Blessed Faber requested that he be able to come to the Vatican, where he could meet up with his old friend he hadn't seen in nearly seven years, St. Ignatius Loyola. Blessed Faber was stricken with a fever and died Aug. 1, 1546, with St. Ignatius Loyola by his side.
Blessed Faber's legacy of serving the Lord and being a companion of Jesus is still a focal point of Jesuit teaching.
"He would simply say that, for him, companionship with Christ meant being with Jesus so he could serve God," said Father Fleming. "We who want to grow as companions of Christ find ourselves saying: 'Blessed Peter Faber, pray for us."