France: Jubilee year for the Society of Jesus
On December 3, 2005 the jubilee year of the Society of Saint Ignatius will open, in France, celebrating the anniversaries of the three founders of the Society of Jesus: the Basque Saint Ignatius of Loyola (450th anniversary of his death), the Navarrese Saint Francis-Xavier and the Savoyard Blessed Peter Favre (500th anniversary of their births).
All three of them were at the College Saint Barbara in Paris, in the 1530’s and they formed a group of students spiritually united, "friends in the Lord" according to Saint Ignatius of Loyola’s expression. Inspired by the same desire to proclaim the Gospel, seven of them gathered on the hill of Montmartre, on August 15 1534, to take the vow to follow Jesus together, practicing evangelical poverty and chastity. In 1538, the companions went to Rome to receive their mission from the hands of the pope. The Society of Jesus was approved by Paul III in 1540.
This Ignatian jubilee year will gather together in Lourdes between July 17 and August 6, 2006 all the members of the Society of Jesus at the national congress of the Christian Life Community. There will also be 17 concerts given in France by a Bolivian music school in honor of the "Jesuit reductions" in Latin America, the play by Fabrice Hadjadj "What does it profit to gain the whole world?", books, symposiums, and itineraries – "Ignatian Paris" – in the footsteps of the first three companions of the Society of Jesus in Paris.
