Ignatius de Loyola formed the “Society of Jesus”, commonly called the Jesuits, in 1534. At the time the Reformation was in full swing in Europe and was seriously weakening the dominance of the Roman Catholic Church. After his organisation was further developed the Pope gave his approval in 1540. With unwavering support for the Pope it engaged in charitable works, teaching, preaching, hearing confessions and missionary work.
However the institution had several unpublicised aims They wanted to bring universal political power to the Papacy and to form a unified church under the Pope. Unlike the Dominicans, who were trying to do this through the Inquisition, the Jesuits were to do this by infiltration and penetration of society in general, the ruling classes in particular and Protestantism.
In 1491 at the Castle of Loyola a Spanish Basque, Inigo Lopez de Recarde was born. He later romanised his name to Ignatius. A police report on him in his youth said he was treacherous, brutal and vindictive. A friend called him “an unruly and conceited soldier.” His secretary Polanco said, “he led a disorderly life as far as women, gambling and duals were concerned.”
He frequently had dreams that explained the dogma of the Catholic Church to him. The Madonna and child appeared to him. The Eternal Father and Christ carrying a cross appeared to him. Throughout his life he had a constant flow of visions and illuminations. He was a medieval mystic devoted to the worship of the Virgin Mary.
He developed a theory concerning the difference between mortal and venial sins. His teaching and training methods got him into trouble with the Inquisition who imprisoned him twice in 1527. He developed his “Cure of Souls.” This developed into a book approved later by the Pope in 1548 called “Spiritual Exercises” which if followed with just a “director” as companion for thirty days gets you filled with the Jesuit spirit. The mysticism of the Jesuit order was caught more than taught.
The initiate is surrounded by those who are able to have mystic experiences so that the initiate gets caught up in the same spirit of it all too. The intention is to “imbue into him spiritual forces which he would find very difficult to eliminate later.” The major dogmas of the church are emotionally engaged with using the imagination with the greatest possible intensity. Women in particular could faint during the exercises. Rhythmic prayers are orchestrated in minutely detailed patterns of expression. The worship of the Virgin Mary is the base of the religious devotions. Mystic experiences have been encouraged even to being comforted by the Virgins breasts.
To become a fully-fledged Jesuit takes a further fourteen years of testing and training. The whole objective is to make an elite Christian (i.e. Catholic). Not by theological understanding but through his mystic experience. The typical temperament of a Jesuit seems to be “a mixture of piety and diplomacy, asceticism and worldly wisdom, mysticism and cold calculation, as was Loyola’s character.”
The Jesuit not only had his own personal will broken but his reasoning and moral scruples too. Their own literature describes a Jesuit as a corpse in the undertaker’s hands. In a letter Ignatius wrote, “We must see black as white if the Church says so.” They are taught to obey their superiors at all costs even if told to do something outrageously criminal.
For the honour of the Catholic Church murder was acceptable and still is. Much public indignation was roused by the Jesuit maxim “A monk or priest is allowed to kill those who are ready to slander him or his community.” To a Jesuit priest if he slept with a woman who threatened to defame him he could murder her to avoid disgrace.
The Vatican believes that all worldly power is to be subject to the Pope and anything that attacks this is to be silenced by whatever means necessary. The Pope considers his authority higher than any national government. Jesuits have always tried to influence all governments to submit to the Vatican.
Only five years after their formation, Pope Paul III gave authority for Jesuits to perform all the rolls of the clergy except to marry but all without needing to be subject to a Bishop. They were authorised to deal in commerce and banking and are able to forgive and be forgiven for virtually any sin whatsoever so long as the Jesuit is loyal to his superiors.
Ignatius went on to write the “Constitutions” which outline how a Jesuit should live. After his death Lainez become the General of the order in 1558. With Salmeron he wrote the “Declarations” which are a commentary on the Constitutions. The General became a very powerful man often known now as the Black Pope. To bring the world to the Pope they set about influencing world rulers. They tried to do this by supplying the priests to whom those in high places would confess their sins to and also by educating their children.
At the next Council of Bishops after their formation (Trent 1545 - 63) they fought off many tough challenges to traditional dogma on behalf of the Pope and became his champion. The Society of Jesus soon won the complete confidence of the Pope through their promise of unconditional obedience. By becoming the Pope’s champion they became very influential throughout Catholicism. They are known to some as the Pope’s secret army. The Papacy and the Jesuits became highly dependant on each other. Some consider the real power in the Vatican now belongs to the Black Pope.
A Jesuit of minor rank agrees to the following oath before he is given a position of command.
Read by Superior:
My son, heretofore you have been taught to act the dissembler (secret traitor), among the Roman Catholics to be a Roman Catholic and to be a spy even among your own brethren. To believe no man, to trust no man. Among the reformers to be a reformer, among the Huguenots to be a Huguenot, among the Calvinists to be a Calvinist, among the Protestants generally to be a Protestant. And obtaining their confidence to seek even to preach from their pulpits and to denounce with all vehemence in your nature our holy religion and the Pope. And even to descend so low as to become a Jew among the Jews. That you might be enabled to gather together all information for the benefit of your order as a faithful soldier of the Pope.
You have been taught to insidiously plant the seeds of jealousy and hatred between states that were at peace and incite them to deeds of blood involving them in war with each other and to create revolutions and civil wars. In communities, provinces and countries that were independent and prosperous, cultivating the arts and sciences and enjoying the blessings of peace. To take sides with the combatants and to act secretly in concert with your brother Jesuit , who might be engaged on the other side but openly opposed to that which you might be connected, only that the church might be the gainer in the end in the conditions fixed in the treaties for peace … and that the end justifies the means.
You have been taught your duty as a spy to gather all statistics, facts and information in your power from every source. To ingratiate yourself into the confidence of the family circle of Protestants and heretics of every class and character. As well as that of the merchant, the banker, the lawyer, among the schools and universities, in parliaments and legislatures and in the judiciaries and councils of state and to “be all things to all men” for the Pope’s sake whose servants we are unto death.
You have received all your instructions heretofore as a novice, a neophyte (new priest) and have served as a coadjutor (helper), confessor and priest but you have not yet been invested with all that is necessary to command in the army of Loyola in the service of the Pope. You must serve the proper time as the instrument and executioner as directed by your superiors, for none can command here who has not consecrated his labours with the blood of the heretic for “without the shedding of blood no man can be saved”. Therefore to fit yourself for your work and to make your own salvation sure you will in addition to your former oath of obedience to your order and allegiance to the Pope repeat after me:
The candidate repeats:
I (candidates name) now, in the presence of Almighty God, the Blessed Virgin Mary, the blessed Michael the Archangel, the blessed St. John the Baptist, the holy Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul and all the saints and sacred hosts of heaven, and to you, my ghostly father, the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, founded by St. Ignatius Loyola in the Pontificate of Paul the Third, and continued to the present, do by the womb of the virgin, the matrix of God, and the rod of Jesus Christ, declare and swear, that his holiness the Pope is Christ's Vice-regent and is the true and only head of the Catholic or Universal Church throughout the earth; and that by virtue of the keys of binding and loosing, given to his Holiness by my Saviour, Jesus Christ, he hath power to depose heretical kings, princes, states, commonwealths and governments, all being illegal without his sacred confirmation and that they may safely be destroyed. Therefore, to the utmost of my power I shall and will defend this doctrine of his Holiness' right and custom against all usurpers of the heretical or Protestant authority whatever, especially the Lutheran of Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and the now pretended authority and churches of England and Scotland, and branches of the same now established in Ireland and on the Continent of America and elsewhere; and all adherents in regard that they be usurped and heretical, opposing the sacred Mother Church of Rome. I do now renounce and disown any allegiance as due to any heretical king, prince or state named Protestants or Liberals, or obedience to any of the laws, magistrates or officers.
I do further declare that the doctrine of the churches of England and Scotland, of the Calvinists, Huguenots and others of the name Protestants or Liberals to be damnable and they themselves damned who will not forsake the same. I do further declare, that I will help, assist, and advise all or any of his Holiness' agents in any place wherever I shall be, in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England, Ireland or America, or in any other Kingdom or territory I shall come to, and do my uttermost to extirpate the heretical Protestants or Liberals' doctrines and to destroy all their pretended powers, regal or otherwise.
I do further promise and declare, that notwithstanding I am dispensed with, to assume my religion heretical, for the propaganda of the Mother Church's interest, to keep secret and private all her agents' counsels from time to time, as they may entrust me and not to divulge, directly or indirectly, by word, writing or circumstance whatever; but to execute all that shall be proposed, given in charge or discovered unto me, by you, my ghostly father, or any of this sacred covenant.
I do further promise and declare, that I will have no opinion or will of my own, or any mental reservation whatever, even as a corpse or cadaver (perinde ac cadaver), but will unhesitatingly obey each and every command that I may receive from my superiors in the Militia of the Pope and of Jesus Christ.
That I may go to any part of the world wither-soever I may be sent, to the frozen regions of the North, the burning sands of the desert of Africa, or the jungles of India, to the centres of civilization of Europe, or to the wild haunts of the barbarous savages of America, without murmuring or repining, and will be submissive in all things whatsoever communicated to me.
Early
Although first formed in France they first took root in Italy. Italian art during the 1500’s demonstrates the theatrical torment loved and promoted by the Jesuits. They were behind the massacre of the Waldenses in 1561. The Waldenses had formed around 1180 within the Catholic Church but after being forced out they became a protestant group of believers. The Jesuits after a season of much favour in Venice were banned in 1606. Sadly they were allowed to return in 1656.
In Portugal after a revolution in 1640 the Jesuits rose to be more powerful than in any other country. They dominated the royal household until 1757 when the prime minister the Marquess of Pombal outlawed all Jesuit confessors. He forbid the Jesuits to preach and eventually banishing them from all Portuguese territories.
In Spain the Jesuits rose to power later than in Portugal. The decline of Spain coincided with this. In 1767 the Bourbon King Charles III suppressed the Jesuits in all Spanish lands. This brought an end to the Jesuit state in Paraguay too. The 6000 Jesuits in Spain were sent by boat to the Pope who on the orders of their general had their boat fired upon with canon. They fled to Corsica.
Although Protestantism was flourishing in Central Europe (France, Holland, Germany and Poland) the Jesuits fought back through Bavaria (South Eastern area of Germany.) In 1556 they infiltrated the ruling classes and influenced princes. A great persecution of Protestants followed. From this base they spread their influence throughout Germany and Austria. They tried to take Bohemia (part of old Czechoslovakia) but were outlawed as promoters of civil war. Later the Jesuits gained control and destroyed all the Czech culture they could find. Eventually protestant forces overcome the Jesuit armies and created a Republic.
In 1620 the Jesuits influenced the emperor Leopold I to eradicate Protestantism in Hungary but the people fought back. Protestants were persecuted again in 1671 but they fought back and finally ousted the Jesuits in 1707. The whole of Germany and many surrounding nations were impoverished by the pursuit of Protestants by the Jesuits.
In Switzerland as normal, they developed a flattering appearance but all they caused was dissension, chaos and confusion. The Jesuits excited the masses to massacre other faiths in 1620, 1656, and 1712. Of coarse if you took part you were absolved of any sin by an indulgence from the Pope. Following the 1712 persecution there was a peoples uprising that defeated the Jesuit leaders who are still forbidden today by law to operate in Switzerland through article 51 of its constitution.
Poland almost came under as much influence of the Jesuits as in Portugal. They used Poland to try and bring Russia under their control which Russia overcome in 1606. After the First World War, Colonel Beck, the Polish Foreign Affairs minister from 1932 to 1939 said, “The Vatican is one of the main causes of the tragedy of my country. I realised too late that we had pursued our foreign policy just to serve the interests of the Catholic Church.”
In 1580 the Jesuits arrived in England and worked hard at trying to bring the nation back to the Pope. Missionaries were trained to stir up the population against Elizabeth I in favour of Mary Stuart. When Mary Stuart was found to be involved with this subversive activity she was executed in 1587. After this the Spanish Armada was sent and failed in 1588. James I who followed Elizabeth was plotted against with the infamous Gunpowder Plot in 1605. Father Garnett a Jesuit was hanged for his involvement. Under Charles I many Jesuits were hanged for their activities. Charles II made a secret pact with Louis XIV to return England to Catholicism. As this became apparent public response was so furious Charles II succumbed and even hanged several Jesuits for treason. He tried to appease the Jesuits though which led to a public uprising and he fled to France and the Jesuits were imprisoned or banished. Staunch Protestants William and Mary were invited to take the throne. In 1701 the Act of Settlement was passed decreeing that a Catholic cannot become the sovereign of the U.K.
In France Protestants had been granted rights under the Edict of Nantes in 1498. However in 1551 Jesuits started to try to influence the country again. The Jesuits were strongly resisted initially but they worked away among the Court and down into the middle class. The Paris University of Theology in 1554 declared, “this society appears to be extremely dangerous regarding the faith, she is an enemy of the Church’s peace, fatal to the monastic state and seems to have been born to bring ruin rather than edification.”
In 1572 the Kings Catholic mother played a major role in the Saint Bartholomew Massacre where thousands of Huguenots (Protestants) were killed. Their activities resulted in the Society of Jesus being banished from the kingdom in 1594.
But they were soon at work again. They were allowed to return in 1603. Under Louis XIV they prospered and in 1681 persuaded him to revoke the Edict of Nantes and start persecution of Protestants again. This caused so much skill and finance to leave France as people fled from this persecution that the nation was left impoverished. As usual when the Jesuits prosper the state suffers.
In 1762 the French parliament examined the Constitutions of the Society and declared it an illegal institution. It indicted them with “The said Institute is inadmissible in any civilised State, as its nature is hostile to all its spiritual and temporal authority. It seeks to introduce into the Church and State under the plausible veil of a religious institute, not an Order truly desirous to spread evangelical perfection, but rather a political body working untiringly at usurping all authority, by all kinds of indirect, secret and devious means … perverse, a destroyer of all religious and honest principles, insulting to Christian morals, pernicious to civil society, hostile to the rights of the nation, the royal power and even the security of the sovereigns and obedience of their subjects, suitable to stir up the greatest disturbances in the state, conceive and maintain the worst kind of corruption in men’s hearts.”
From 1851 under Louis Napoleon the Jesuits prospered again in France. They promoted the war against Russia as a holy war it became the Crimean War which left 95,000 Frenchmen, 21,000 British and 450,000 Russians dead. Again in 1870 the Jesuits were behind the disaster of the French declaring war on the superior forces of Prussia.
The Jesuits tried hard to make in-roads into India, Japan, China and also South America but they did not get very far.
Initially Jesuits ran colleges that competed with the state universities but as science outrun them this ploy was left behind. Before the formation of the Jesuits the practice of confession was not particularly common They revived it and in so doing had access to the deep places of the ruling classes of a nation. The reports of Jesuit confessors around the world have been of great use to the Catholic cause.
Disbanded
During the 1700’s their activities fell into such disrepute across the world that they were outlawed in many countries. Their complete hatred of democracy and freedom of thought were clearly revealed for all to see. The financial exploitation of their conquests abroad, loose morals and continual political intrigues brought them into such disgrace that Pope Clement XIV was finally forced to Disbanded the Jesuits in 1773. International pressure was high even some of the Papal States had been occupied by military forces of his opponents. He died of poisoning 14 months later. No one was charged with the crime.
At this time Jesuits were only accepted in the nations of Prussia and Russia as educators. They were eventually banned from Prussia in 1786. They were banished from Saint - Petersburg and Moscow in 1815 with these words, “We came to realise that they did not fulfil the duties expected of them … Instead of living as peaceful inhabitants in a foreign country, they disturbed the Greek religion which has been since ancient times, the predominant religion in our empire and on which rests the peace and happiness of the nations under our sceptre. They abused the confidence they obtained and turned the youth entrusted to them and inconsistent women away from our worship … We are not surprised that this religious Order was expelled from every country and that their actions were not tolerated anywhere.” There were ousted from the whole of Russia in 1820.
Most of the former Jesuits then mingled with the clergy in Austria, France, Spain and Italy. Jean de Tournely founded the Society of the Sacred Heart in Belgium as a teaching body in 1794. Paccanari founded the Society of the Brothers of Faith in 1797. These two societies merged in 1799 under the ex-Jesuit Father Clariviere. In 1803 they joined together with the Russian ex-Jesuits. The world did not seem to notice this restructuring.
Re-established
Following the French Revolution in 1814 Pope Pius VII re-established the Jesuits but wherever liberal minded people gained the victory the Jesuits were expelled. They were expelled from France again in 1901, Portugal in 1834, Spain in 1820, 1835 and 1868, Switzerland in 1848, Germany in 1872 and France in 1880 and 1901. Their activities were suppressed in Italy from 1859, Guatemala from 1872, Mexico from 1873, Brazil in 1874, Ecuador and Columbia in 1875 and Costa Rica in 1884.
Ironically the only places where they were not expelled were countries where the Protestants were in the majority and the Jesuit activities had much less overall effect as in England, Sweden, Denmark and the U.S.A.
The First World War
In 1882 the Catholic dominated nations of Germany, Austria/Hungary and Italy formed the Triple Alliance. In 1907 Britain, France and Russia (who protected Serbia) entered the Triple Entente. In 1914 Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot when visiting Sarajevo in Serbia. Austria used this as an excuse to declared war on Serbia. Russia and France declared war on Austria so Germany declared war on France and Russia. Germany on its way to invading France first invaded neutral Belgium. As Britain had promised to protect Belgium it declared war on Germany.
In 1904 France had broken off relations with the Vatican because the Vatican would only approve Bishops that were hostile to the French government. The separation of Church and State followed. This angered the Vatican who holds that all secular authority must be subject to ecclesiastical authority, which is still its objective today. The Vatican did not appreciate France’s “Entente Cordiale” with Britain either. Meanwhile Serbia in the Balkans, which was firmly Orthodox, was flourishing.
The Jesuits and the Pope were able to heavily influence the Triple Alliance unlike the Triple Entente, which they hated. Meanwhile the Pope was encouraging the Austrian / Hungry Emperor to invade Serbia when a Macedonian shot Ferdinand (a key man for the Pope in Austria). This provided strength to the argument to invade. During the war the Vatican did all it could to break up the Triple Entente.
When it was clear that Germany was losing the war the Pope unsuccessfully struggled to create a peace before Germany was completely defeated. Before being overcome the German forces ceased hostilities in 1918, however they did not formally unconditionally surrender. At the peace treaty conference afterwards in 1919 called the Treaty of Versailles, Germany did not participate in the discussions. The treaty was harsh on Germany, which it resented. The flames of this resentment where fanned by the Vatican who supported the rise of Hitler.
The Allies knew full well the Vatican’s involvement in the war and refused it a place at the peace treaty conference afterwards. Sadly no sanctions against the Vatican at this time were instigated to prevent any further evil intrigues. The Vatican could not influence the German Republic that was created in the same way as it had influenced Germany before.
The Second World War
The Vatican was furious at having its wings clipped in Germany and played a major roll in Hitler’s lightening rise to power. The book Mein Kampf said to be written by Hitler was really authored by Jesuit Father Staempfle.
The Vatican gave substantial support to Mussolini who came to power in Italy in 1922. Mussolini gave substantial support to Hitler who came to power in Germany in 1933. Pope Pius XII not only personally supported Hitler the whole Catholic Church did. A Concordat (agreement) was made between the Vatican and the Nazi regime in 1933. The Concordat required that the bishops take an oath of allegiance to Hitler, which they complied with enthusiastically. The concentration camps in Germany already contained 40,000 prisoners at this time.
Using Jesuit negotiators in 1938 Hitler unified Austria and Germany peacefully and he took control of part of Czechoslovakia. In 1939 while Mussolini took Ethiopia and Albania, Hitler took Bohemia, Moravia, Slovakia and more of Czechoslovakia. Slovakia had Tiso a Jesuit priest installed as Head of State (with the Popes blessing.) Tiso was the first to send Jews to Auschwitz to be exterminated.
Hitler and Mussolini took Yugoslavia in 1941. Yugoslavia consisted mainly of two main ethnic groups, the Catholic Croatians and the Orthodox Serbians, who had managed to live peaceably for decades. Jews and Serbians were now outlawed, most were massacred some were allowed to convert to Catholicism. Some of the worst war crimes were carried out here. 300,000 Serbs were deported, 500,000 were massacred.
When Yugoslavia was eventually liberated the Vatican hid the assassins in convents in Austria and Italy. Later they were sent on to “friendly” countries with false passports. One of the greatest cover-ups during the war crimes tribunal was for Stepinac the archbishop of Zagreb. He was later made a Cardinal for overseeing the massacre of 280,000 Orthodox Serbs out of a total of 460,000 in his archbishopric.
Pope Pius XII never condemned the war waged by Hitler or any of the incredibly evil crimes carried out during it. His silence has been suggested as constituting collaboration. In fact several senior Catholic officials were sent to assist Hitler.
True Nature of the Vatican
One of Hitler’s top men Hermann Rauschning reported Hitler as saying “I learned much from the Order of the Jesuits. Until now there has never been anything more grandiose on the earth than the hierarchical organisation of the Catholic Church. I transferred much of this organisation into my own party … I am going to let you in on a secret … I am founding an Order … In my ‘Brugs’ of the Order we will raise up a youth, which will make the earth tremble. Hitler then stopped, saying that he could not say any more.
Walter Schellenburg chief of Nazi counter espionage reported Hitler’s words “The SS organisation had been constituted by Himmler according to the principles of the Jesuit Order. Their regulations and the Spiritual Exercises proscribed by Ignatius of Loyola were the model Himmler tried to copy exactly… The ‘Reichsfuhrer SS,’ Himmler’s title as supreme chief of the SS, was to be the equivalent of the Jesuits General and the whole structure of the SS was a close imitation of the Catholic Church’s hierarchical order. Hitler said “I can see Himmler as our Ignatius of Loyola”.
Franz von Papen a papal secret chamberlain said, “The Third Reich is the first world power which not only acknowledges but also puts into practice the high principles of the papacy.” These high principles in the past led to what is called the Inquisition and the 25 million (U.N. official figure) victims of Nazi concentration camps that were killed due to the same high principles as the Inquisition.
In 1937 the Catholic writer Abbe Jean Vieujan in Great Apologetics wrote, “To accept the principles of the Inquisition, one only needs a Christian mentality, and this is what many Christians lack … The (Roman Catholic) Church has no such timidity.”
The Vatican is master of saying one thing while doing another. It would obviously not do itself much good today to publicise that it reserves the right to exterminate those who oppose her but not so long ago it did not hid this fact. It would appear it has always done so and has never renounced this activity.
Franz Wernz a German Jesuit wrote “The Church can condemn heretics, for any rights they have are though our tolerance, and these rights are apparent not real”. In 1908 Cardinal Lepicier wrote “If someone professes publicly to be an heretic or tries to pervert others by his speech or example, he can not only be excommunicated but also justly killed”. Pope Leo XIII said “ Anathema on the one who says ‘the Holy Spirit does not want us to kill the heretics”.
While the Jesuit roots of the Nazi regime has been clarified it ought also be made clear that the Nazi attempt to take over Europe used every occult method available, a point that has been played down in mainstream war reporting. The higher you go into the Roman Catholic hierarchy the more occultic it becomes.
This is a summary of: The Secret History of the Jesuits - Edmond Paris