Jesuits Missionaries and India

1259 Words6 Pages
Jesuits are the members of the Society of Jesus which is a Christian male religious congregation of the Catholic Church. Ignatius of Loyola was the founder of the society. In 1534, Ignatius and six young men including Francis Xavier and Peter Faber, became its member and took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience , a special vow of obedience to Pope. The purpose of Jesuits is to propagate the catholic faith but they also work brilliantly in the fields of education, academic research, and cultural pursuits. They also work for hospitals and to promote social justice. In India mainly two kinds of concepts are famous about the role of Jesuit Missionaries in India; both concepts are radical or extremist. One concept is affected by those European thinkers (mainly Hegel) who think that Pre-British India was in primitive phase or state of civilisational development and the second concept is about those people who were affected by revolt of ‘Arya samaj’, that is, in the spree of modernism whichever scientific development took place and all the modern political theories which were proposed, all have their origins in Vedas. And today this concept allows the growth of staunch or fanatic or hardcore and militant Hinduism. These two concepts produce hindrances in logically understanding the sociable and humanitarian role of Jesuits Saints. One has to keep a critical attitude and aloofness towards these two illogical or irrational concepts to understand impartially the contribution of Jesuit missionaries in the building of modern India and their works for humanity, and then consider or meditate over their roles and importance. In this essay an attempt is made to critically consider or meditate on their arrival in India and the works done by them. Indian society has always been a society full of contradictions since ancient time. Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru has said that on one
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