St Claude de la Columbiere SJ -- Loving
(1641-1682) St Claude de la Columbiere was born in France and enjoyed an intense, if brief, life, notable for the part he played as champion of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He is remembered principally as the spiritual director who recognized the truth of the revelation about the Sacred Heart that St. Margaret Mary Alacoque received. He also showed heroic virtue in enduring imprisonment in England that weakened his health and led to an early death.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin SJ – Intellectually Competent
(1881—1955) French-born Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a geologist who worked to understand evolution and faith as part of a research team that discovered the “Peking Man” remains in remote deserts in China. He participated fully in an intellectual life through the development of his imaginative, mystical writings on the evolutionary nature of the world and the cosmos, which he believed evolves towards Christ.
Pedro Arrupe SJ - Religious
(1907-1991) Pedro Arrupe has been called the “Second Founder” of the Society of Jesus. The Spanish Jesuit was serving as novice master in Hiroshima, Japan, when the U.S dropped a nuclear omb on that city; he used his medical training to care for survivors. He was later chosen to lead the Jesuits through a tumultuous period of ecclesial and cultural renewal after the Second Vatican Council. Arrupe championed a spirituality meant to engage the world rather than to retreat from it, and his legacy is one of “men and women with and for others,” committed to human dignity and the common good. He helped integrate lay men and women into the Jesuit mission understood as the service of faith and the promotion of justice.
Servant of God Matteo Ricci SJ – Open to Growth
(1552-1610) Matteo Ricci pioneered a missionary method that opened the door Christianity into China. The Italian Jesuit began by studying Chinese language and culture in depth, then introduced Western science and technology to win the friendship of curious Chinese scholars. Ricci’s accurate prediction of eclipses and other astronomical events necessary for the preparation of the imperial calendar gave him access to the inner court of Emperor Wanli. He also helped translate Euclid’s Elements of Geometry into Chinese and took care of the different gifts—including mechanical clocks and a harpsichord—he had given to the emperor. Ricci wrote a comprehensive presentation of Catholic doctrine in a language and categories that related well to Chinese traditional culture and Confucian classics.
St. Alberto Hurtado SJ - Committed to Justice
(1901-1952) St. Alberto Hurtado had a doctorate in education and taught at the secondary and university levels in Chile but is most known for his dedication to social justice. He founded a magazine to promote the social teaching of the church and worked at the pragmatic level of creating shelters for people experiencing homelessness. He founded a non-profit organization, Hogar de Cristo, that continues to play a key role in Chile. He became famous for the green pickup truck he bought in 1946 to bring at-risk children living on the streets to safe shelters. Despite his hectic schedule, Hurtado understood the need for balance between prayer and work, striving to be a “contemplative in action.”