The Autobiography Of St Ignatius

St Ignatius of Loyola was a Spanish Christian saint who lived from 1491-1556. St Ignatius is best known for being the founder of the Society of Jesus sometimes called the Bollandists after St. Bolland who founded the French group. This autobiographical record tells his life and his philosophy.

Saint Ignatius of Loyola was a man who saw above and beyond his century, a man of vision and calm hope, who could step comfortably into our era and the Church of our time and show us how to draw closer to Christ. Ignatius' autobiography spans eighteen very important years of this saint's 65-year life...from his wounding at Pamplona (1521) through his conversion, his university studies and his journey to Rome in order to place his followers and himself at the disposal of the Pope. These critical years reveal the incredible transformation and spiritual growth in the soul of a great saint and the events that helped to bring about that change in his life. This classic work merits a long life. Apart from providing a splendid translation of the saint's original text, Father Tylenda has included an informative commentary which enables the modern reader to grasp various allusions in the text-and to gain a better view of a saintly man baring his soul.

Reproduction of the original: The Autobiography of St. Ignatius by Saint Ignatius Loyola

One of the key figures in Christian history, St. Ignatius of Loyola (c. 1491-1556) was a passionate and unique spiritual thinker and visionary. The works gathered here provide a first-hand, personal introduction to this remarkable character: a man who turned away from the Spanish nobility to create the revolutionary Jesuit Order, inspired by the desire to help people follow Christ. His Reminiscences describe his early life, his religious conversion following near-paralysis in battle, and his spiritual and physical ordeals as he struggled to assist those in need, including plague, persecution and imprisonment. The Spiritual Exercises offer guidelines to those seeking the will of God, and the Spiritual Diary shows Ignatius in daily mystical contact with God during a personal strugg;e. The Letters collected here provide an insight into Ignatius' ceaseless campaign to assist those seeking enlightenment and to direct the young Society of Jesus.

The Autobiography of St. Ignatius chronicles the life of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus.

"Above all, remember that God looks for solid virtues in us, such as patience, humility, obedience, abnegation of your own will - that is, the good will to serve Him and our neighbor in Him. His providence allows us other devotions only insofar as He sees that they are useful to us." "The fountain-head of all other biographies of the saint. We call it a source, for it is from it that all other 'lives' must draw, since it is really the autobiography of the saint....The present autobiography lays bare the deepest spiritual activities and the workings of divine grace, which together, in and by the Exercises, disciplined the soul of Ignatius. So that the reader would understand the Society of Jesus he must know its founder, and to know the founder he must study the Testament of Ignatius Loyola. He will understand the Testament by no helps more efficacious than those contained in the annotations subjoined to each chapter of the present volume....The experience and maxims of St. Ignatius are studied both in their natural and their supernatural elements, and with a spiritual discernment that bespeaks most plainly the disciplinary power of the Exercises themselves." -The American Ecclesiastical Review, Volume 23, 1900 This account of the life of St. Ignatius, dictated by himself, is considered by the Bollandists the most valuable record of the great Founder of the Society of Jesus. Few works in ascetic literature, except the writings of St. Teresa and St. Augustine, impart such a knowledge of the soul. To understand fully the Spiritual Exercises, we should know something of the man who wrote them. In this life of St. Ignatius, told in his own words, we acquire an intimate knowledge of the author of the Exercises. We discern the Saint's natural disposition, which was the foundation of his spiritual character. We learn of his conversion, his trials, the obstacles in his way, the heroism with which he accomplished his great mission.

Autobiography of Saint Ignatius of Loyola translated by Parmananda R. Divarkar with notes and an introduction by Barton Geger, S.J. Jesuit history, spirituality, pedagogy, philosophy.

"The autobiography...does not cover the complete life of Ignatius. It begins abruptly in 1521 at the great turning point in the saint's life, his injury in the battle of Pamplona when the French occupied that town and attacked its citadel. It then spans the next seventeen years up to the arrival of Ignatius and his early companions in Rome. These years are the central years of Ignatius's life. They are the years that open with his religious conversion and that witness his spiritual growth. They are the years of pilgrimage, to use his own designation, of active travel and searching, and of interior progress in the Christian life. They are the years of preparation for the establishment of the great religious order he will found and for its dynamic thrust in the turbulent Europe and the expanding world of his day."--