Pedro Arrupe: Un uomo per gli altri (review)

The year 2007 marked the centenary of the birth of Pedro Arrupe, superior general of the Society of Jesus from 1965 until 1983, the year in which, severely impaired by a stroke, he resigned. His years as general immediately after the Second Vatican Council were tumultuous for the Church and for the Jesuits. Arrupe, caught in the middle of them, met with distrust from the Holy See and with fierce resistance from a small but influential number of Jesuits. The result was that in 1981 Pope John Paul II directly intervened into the procedures of the Society by appointing his own delegate to run the order until an appropriate time could be found to restore the ordinary government of the Society.

Most Jesuits, however, enthusiastically supported Arrupe during his generalate and developed a deep affection for him because of his winning personality and his obviously deep spirituality. Support for him surged in 1981 at the time of the papal intervention. Since his death in 1991 esteem for him on the part of both Jesuits and others has grown to veneration, and one hears individuals expressing hope for his canonization. The centenary year was observed with conferences and other commemorative events around the globe, which included the production by Georgetown University of an excellent documentary film on his life (available on DVD from the Institute of Jesuit Sources, St. Louis).

The present, massive volume edited by Gianni La Bella, professor of Contemporary History at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, is probably the most lasting contribution to the centenary. I approached it with prejudice, fearing that as a centenary volume, it would be an uncritical encomium. I felt my fears confirmed when I saw that some of the contributors to the volume had been collaborators with Arrupe in the government of the order. The fears were misplaced. The volume is certainly appreciative of Arrupe and not innocent of a few pious asides. In the main, however, it is a remarkably thorough and honest account of a career important not only for the Society of Jesus but particularly as illuminating the broader picture of Catholicism in the immediate postconciliar era.

The volume consists of twenty-seven contributions, ranging in length from the 124 pages of Urbano Valero's account of the Thirty-First General Congregation of the Jesuits, 1965–66, at which Arrupe was elected, to the ten pages by Michael Campbell-Johnston on the Jesuit Refugee Service, which Arrupe founded. After Valero's, the next longest contribution is by Alfonso Álvarez Bolado on the Thirty-Second General Congregation, 1974–75, called by Arrupe in part as an occasion to assess the direction he was giving the Society. The congregations deserve the space allotted to them. Ten contributions deal with Arrupe's relationship to different parts of the world—Africa, Latin America, Central America, and so forth. A few of the remaining contributions are strictly biographical, such as his years as a missionary in Japan and his final years in the Jesuit infirmary, but most of them deal with general themes, such as his style of governing, his commitment to social justice, and his way of dealing with the problem of the large number of Jesuits leaving the Society.

In such a comprehensive volume the quality of the contributions is bound to vary, but La Bella has maintained a high standard. As to be expected, the more incisive pieces are those by trained scholars, such as Jean-Yves Calvez on "Cultura, Vangelo, e dialogo." The top prize goes to La Bella himself—for his introduction, which is a brisk and judicious review of events and issues, and then for his long contribution on Arrupe and the "severe crisis" of the Society, that is, the growing tensions and misunderstandings during the 1970s between the Holy See and the Jesuits' central government under Arrupe. La Bella, it is worth noting...