The Suppression of the Jesuits

On 21 July 1773 Clement XIV issued at Rome the brief Dominus ac Redemptor, dated from St Mary Major in the fifth year of his pontificate (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, closing line, ‘Given at Rome’). It recalls religious orders that earlier popes had dissolved, among them the Templars, suppressed by Clement V in 1312 (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘Other Roman Pontiffs’). Those popes, the brief says, acted from the fullness of their power, without a judicial trial and without letting the orders answer the charges against them (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘But in deciding’).

The brief then turns to the Society of Jesus (see the Society of Jesus Is Founded). It says the Society was founded for the salvation of souls and the conversion of heretics and unbelievers (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘We have before our eyes’), and that Paul III approved it in 1540 (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘Pope Paul III’). Almost from the beginning, it goes on, there was discord inside the Society and between it and other orders, the secular clergy, universities and princes (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘Nevertheless, from the tone’). Among the quarrels it lists is the dispute over rites used in some places that departed from those approved by the universal Church (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘To the great sorrow’) (compare the Chinese Rites Controversy). It reports that the kings of France, Spain, Portugal and the Two Sicilies had expelled the Jesuits from their realms (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘After so many’) and had pressed first Clement XIII and then Clement XIV to suppress the Society altogether (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘Our aforementioned dearest sons’).

Clement declares that the Society can no longer bear the fruit for which it was founded and that lasting peace can hardly be restored to the Church while it exists, and by his apostolic power he abolishes it, with its offices, houses, schools, colleges and constitutions (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘We have used many’). The authority of the general and the other superiors passes to the local bishops, and no more novices may be received (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘Therefore we declare’). Members not yet ordained are released from their simple vows (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘But our efforts’). Ordained members may enter another order or live as secular clergy under the bishops, supported from the revenues of their former houses (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘To all ordained members’). The suppression extends to the missions (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘We wish that whatever’). Clergy are forbidden to speak or write about the suppression and its causes without the pope’s leave (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘In addition, we order’).

The bull of Pius VII that undid the brief tells what followed. Former Jesuits living as secular priests in the Russian Empire asked to remain united in one body, and the emperor Paul I recommended them to the pope in a letter of 11 August 1800 (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 2). In March 1801 Pius allowed them to form a congregation of the Society of Jesus within Russia (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 3), and in 1804, at King Ferdinand’s request, he extended the grant to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 4). On 7 August 1814 (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum closing line), citing requests from archbishops, bishops and other distinguished persons (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 5), he extended it to the Papal States and to all other states (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 7) and set aside Dominus ac Redemptor so far as it stood in the way (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 12).

Clement’s brief rests the suppression on the peace of the Church and on other reasons which, he writes, he keeps in his own mind (Clement XIV, Dominus ac Redemptor, para. beginning ‘We have used many’). Forty-one years later Pius restored the Society by the same fullness of apostolic power (Pius VII, Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum 7).