Pedro Arrupe

Pedro Arrupe, SJ ( born November 14, 1907 in Bilbao, Spain, † February 5, 1991 in Rome) was a Spanish religious cleric. He was the 28th Superior General of the Society of Jesus ( Jesuits; lat: Society of Jesus ).

Life

The Arrupe Basque began to study medicine at the University of Madrid, but did not finish it. In 1927 he entered the Society of Jesus, completed his novitiate at the Monasterio de San Ignacio de Loyola in Azpeitia in the province of Gipuzkoa, and then began his study of philosophy in Oña in the province of Burgos.

Because the Second Spanish Republic dissolved the Jesuit order in 1932 in Spain, studied in the Belgian Arrupe Marneffe and Ignatius College in Valkenburg Valkenburg in the Netherlands. 1936 received Arrupe Marneffe in the priesthood. The usual time after ordination fourth year theology studies, he graduated from the American University of Saint Mary in Leavenworth and then be Tertiate in Cleveland / Ohio. From there he was sent by the Order on 15 October 1938 as a missionary to Japan. By 1940, he studied the Japanese language and worked in a poor district of Tokyo. From 1940 to 1942 he was pastor in Yamaguchi. From 1942 worked Arrupe as novice master in Hiroshima, where he witnessed the dropping of the atomic bomb. Since he lived in one of the German Jesuit brothers built of solid stone schoolhouse, he survived and was able to set up together with the novices an emergency hospital. In 1954, he was Vice-Provincial, according to the survey of Japan for the Province of the Jesuit Order, 1958, the first Provincial.

As the 27th Superior General of the Order, Jean Baptiste Janssens, 1964, died in 1965, the General Assembly of the Order of Pedro Arrupe on May 22 to 28, the Superior General. In this role, he drove with his charisma and great personal piety of the Order by the upheaval years after the Second Vatican Council, which bestowed the Order of a serious crisis.

He held until his stroke in August 1981 this office. At this time Arrupe had already tried to convene a General Congregation of the Order for the election of a successor. However, this delayed Pope John Paul II, the Jesuit Paolo Dezza instead appointed as personal delegate to the head of the Order. Arrupe itself was marked by illness, no longer able to perform the duties. Not until 1983 was a General Congregation to be convened; these elected Peter Hans Kolvenbach as the new Superior General; Arrupe was among the first to congratulate.

At the age of 84 years, Pedro Arrupe died on 5 February in Rome in 1991.

Works

• Yo Vivi la bomba Atomica (1952 )
• Arrupe, Pedro: Our witness must be credible. A Jesuit on the problems of the Church and the world in the late 20th century. With a foreword by Karl Rahner. Ostfildern ( Schwabenverlag ). 2nd edition 1981.
• Zwiefelhofers, Hans ( ed.): In the service of the Gospel. Selected writings of Fr Pedro Arrupe SJ, Superior General of the Society of Jesus ( 1965-1983 ). Munich ( Erich Wewel ) 1987.