Loyola, St. Ignatius of

(1491-1556)

   A native of Gúipuzcoa, in the Basque region of Spain, St. Ignatius was born to a noble family. In 1521, he was wounded in the leg in the siege of Pamplona while serving in the Duke of Nagara's army. While recovering, he read stories from the life of Christ and the saints and was so taken by the readings that he decided to devote himself to the religious life. From 1522 until 1523, he was on retreat in Manresa where he experienced visions and wrote the Spiritual Exercises, a text he published in 1548 meant to inspire devotion through prayer, meditation, and other prescribed practices. In 1534, St. Ignatius established the Jesuit Order. He was ordained in Venice in 1537, after a year of pilgrimage in Spain. He and his followers had vowed to also do pilgrimage in Jerusalem. Unable to do so, they instead went to Rome to offer their services to the pope. In Rome, St. Ignatius experienced another vision where Christ appeared to him and assured him that all would go well. All did in fact go well as Pope Paul III gave the Jesuit Order his approval in 1540. St. Ignatius was canonized in 1622 by Gregory XV.