St. Ignatius of Loyola
Patron of retreats, soldiers, and discernment
- Feast day
- July 31
- Origin
- Basque Country, Spain
- Era
- 16th century
- Order
- Society of Jesus
- Canonised
- 1622
About the saint
Íñigo López de Loyola was a Basque nobleman and soldier until a French cannonball shattered his leg at Pamplona in 1521. Bedridden for months with nothing to read but a life of Christ and a book of saints, he noticed that daydreams of glory left him empty while thoughts of following Christ left him at peace. That observation became the foundation of his teaching on discernment of spirits.
He spent a year in a cave at Manresa, studied late in life alongside teenagers, and in 1534 gathered six companions at Montmartre. The Society of Jesus was approved in 1540.
Under him the Jesuits opened schools across Europe and sent missionaries to Asia and the Americas. He died in Rome in 1556.
Works
The Spiritual Exercises
A four-week programme of prayer and discernment still used in retreats worldwide.
Read it →Constitutions of the Society of Jesus
The governing document of the Jesuit order.
Read it →Autobiography (The Pilgrim's Testament)
His life dictated to a companion near the end of his life.
Read it →
Documented miracles
The recovery at Loyola
His survival of catastrophic leg wounds and repeated surgeries was attributed to the intercession of St. Peter on whose vigil he turned the corner.
Loyola, 1521
The illumination at the Cardoner
Sitting by a river near Manresa he received an understanding he said taught him more than everything else in his life combined.
Manresa, 1522