The second edition of this comprehensive, scholarly, and well–documented one–volume history of the Jesuits is the last work of William V. Bangert, S.J., who taught history at Fordham University and at Jesuit seminaries throughout the United States.
He tells the story of the Jesuits from the early life of Ignatius of Loyola and the founding of the Society of Jesus in 1540 through the 33rd General Congregation in 1983. While the book’s narrative is chronological, Bangert never loses sight of the ever–changing ecclesiastical, political, social, and cultural contexts within which the Jesuits carried on their lives and activities. Major sections cover the “Confrontation with the Age of Reason” in the 17th and 18th centuries, the “Exile, Suppression, and Restoration” of the Society in the 18th and early 19th centuries, and the “Accommodation to a New Political, Social, and Colonial World.”
Paperback, 578 pages.