Pedro de Ribadeneyra and the First Ex-Jesuits: Jesuit Anxiety about Familial Interference to Vocational Perseverance

This article examines a series of dialogues by Pedro de Ribadeneyra (1527-1611) that recount stories of men who left the Society of Jesus only to endure a wide variety of misfortunes thereafter. These dialogues reveal a certain anxiety within the Society of Jesus concerning men who abandoned their vocation. When compared with Jesuit hagiographies, the stories of these men who left the Society show that the Jesuits were concerned that proximity to family could present temptations too poweful to overcome for many Jesuits. Ultimately, the rhetorical and propagandistic nature of the text presents the defectors as foils to showcase the holiness of the Society and its saints. Keywords: familial obligation, Pedro de Ribadeneyra, hagiography, divine punishment, rhetoric, vice and virtue
Introduction For centuries the historians of the Society of Jesus fell into two polemical parties. On the one hand, the apologists, composed primarily of Jesuits themselves, praised the Society's holiness, [...]