St. Ignatius of Loyola

Abstract

St. Ignatius of Loyola was not only one of the most important religious scholars, having founded the Jesuit religion, but he was also one of the more important educational scholars. Ignatius found a lot of things in life to be important, but among those, he found education to be of the utmost importance. Upon receiving the Pope’s blessing in 1540 and founding the Society of Jesus, Ignatius began to teach others the ways of the society and of the mission that they strived for. In order to build the foundation for the Jesuit Education, Ignatius released countless religious works that contributed to the Jesuit education. It is important to understand those works to understand the foundation of Jesuit education. Ignatius felt that he was responsible for the education of his followers, so he began to open schools. One of the main goals of Jesuit education is centered around becoming a person of choice. Jesuits believe that by educating individuals on the world around them, they can make the world a better place. Through their education, they also encourage people to care and be more concerned with their fellow humans. Ignatius built a curriculum centered on an appreciation for the arts, grammar to learn how to read and write, rhetoric to express oneself, and mathematics and logic to help one with critical thinking. He wanted to ensure that the education across schools was the same, which is why he developed a curriculum for all of the schools to use, one that is still implemented today.