Jesuits?

[Hopkirk]

I keep hearing that Pope Francis is the first Jesuit Pope.

What on earth is a Jesuit?
Not another faction within a many splintered religion is it?

[ummmm]

A believer in Jesus.

[Hopkirk]

Er ... you mean the rest don't?

[LazyGun]

"Gods Marines" according to this article I read. They got a badge and a latin motto and everything :)

Evangelical order within the catholic church, with a strong focus on education. research and other intellectual persuits.

[rowanwitch]

I don't know but I have met a few mostly hospital chaplains and teachers and they have all seemed intelligent thoughtful men and I am mostly anti faith but I've liked the ones I've met as people rather than priests

[chrissa1]

My late husband went to a Jesuit Boarding School from the age of seven and hated every minute of it.
He called them God's Mafia.

[Clanad]

A relifious society within the Catholic Church founded in the mid-1500's by Ignatius of Loyola, a Basque-Spaniard who had a military background before experiencing a conversion.

There are several such "Societies" within the Catholic Church... the Dominicans, the Benedictines and others. There are numerous comparable "societies of nuns or Sisters as well.

It's interesting to note that many of the priests that accompanied the Conquistadores to the New World were Jesuits. They were totally devoted to the Pope and his 'Infallibility' in regrads to church matters.
I've many friends that went to Catholic schools that were administered by the Jesuits... almost all of them (the former students) are lapsed Catholics...

[woofgang]

Aren't they the "give me a child until he is five" bunch?

[mikey4444]

When I was growing up as a little Catholic boy in the 50's and 60's, the Jesuits were referred to as "the shock troops of Rome" We were always a bit afraid of them when they came to our school to teach. They were even freer with the cane than the Nuns, and that was saying something !

Read "Angela's Ashes" and prepare to be shocked. Ireland and everything to do with the Catholic Church doesn't come out very well, Jesuits included.