Jesuits Puzzled By Pope’s Rebuke

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31223, 22 November 1966, Page 17

Jesuits Puzzled By Pope’s Rebuke

(N.Z. Press Association —Copyright)

ROME, November 21

The warning by Pope Paul to the Jesuits to watch their step has left Roman Catholicism’s strongest order perplexed and troubled, the Associated Press reported.

Leaders of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) are puzzled why the Pope singled out the Jesuits to rebuke for world-

liness, and they are fearful of possible effects on the order.

Last Wednesday, in a speech mingling censure with praise, the Pontiff told the Jesuits he had heard “strange and sinister” reports about their order. He warned them not to abandon their historic principles and to remain obedient to the Papacy. It was the strongest reproof from the Pope’s lips in his three-year reign and it shook the 36,000-member society.

Many top Jesuits are afraid It may have disruptive effects on seminarians and young Jesuits.

Some observers thought the Pope must have been addressing his rebuke to the most progressive and modernminded elements of the order. But there is puzzlement because nothing happened inside this group that is significantly more progressive than many of the changes backed by the Pope for the entire Church.