Jesuit

Resplendent in black cassock and matching skullcap, the bearded Jesuit appears in a YouTube video breaking bread with opposition activists and donating blood at a makeshift rebel clinic, highlighting his solidarity with the Syrian rebellion. But Father Paolo Dall'Oglio, a brawny bear of a man who enunciates each word with a theatrical sense of certitude, scoffs at the "jihad priest" label. He says he remains committed to a peaceful resolution of the conflict in his adopted homeland -- a "jihad of the spirit, not a jihad of arms," as he declared during a recent stay in the rebel-occupied Syrian town of Qusair.

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but this one has inspired many more, because it has become a departure point for how Europeans became acquainted with Asia. When the Getty acquired an 17th century drawing by Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens, "Man in Korean Costume," at a 1983 auction, it was already well known among the cognoscenti. Then six years ago Getty curator Stephanie Schrader learned that it had inspired two books in Korea - a bestselling novel in 1993 and a nonfiction volume by a Jesuit historian in 2004.

Nine former Salvadoran soldiers and military officials were in custody Monday at an army base while fighting extradition to Spain in the killings of six Jesuit priests and two others during El Salvador's civil war. The Salvadoran government said in a statement that the men, among 20 ex-soldiers indicted by a Spanish judge in May, were in the custody of a civilian court that handles extradition cases. The suspects turned themselves in at the military installation Sunday afternoon, as Salvadoran police were preparing to arrest them on an extradition order from Interpol.

The young inmates in a Los Angeles County juvenile detention facility are an ocean apart from the most powerful man in the world's largest church. But this week, they were linked in an Easter Week rite of healing and humility 2 millennia old. Pope Francis chose to celebrate Holy Thursday by sinking to his knees to wash and kiss the feet of a dozen youth inmates in an Italian juvenile jail - breaking from the tradition of performing that ritual with priests in the ornate cathedrals of Rome.

Toward the end of his largely autobiographical tour of "the consciousness movement" of the late 1970s and the '80s, David Toolan compares himself to missionary-explorers of the late 16th Century such as Roberto de Nobili and Matteo Ricci, who ventured into India, China and Japan to export the blessings of Western civilization and Catholicism but also to discover the mysteries of the Orient. The simile is multiply apt. Not only were Ricci and De Nobili also Jesuits but, as Jonathan Spence pointed out in "The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci," despite their single-mindedness, the initial enthusiasm of these tough-minded scholars gave way year by year to disillusionment and the disaffection of culture shock.

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but this one has inspired many more, because it has become a departure point for how Europeans became acquainted with Asia. When the Getty acquired an 17th century drawing by Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens, "Man in Korean Costume," at a 1983 auction, it was already well known among the cognoscenti. Then six years ago Getty curator Stephanie Schrader learned that it had inspired two books in Korea - a bestselling novel in 1993 and a nonfiction volume by a Jesuit historian in 2004.

VATICAN CITY - In a busy first full day as head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis on Thursday showed that he intends to shun the trappings of high office and introduce a humble note to the papacy. The 76-year-old pontiff returned to the clerical residence in Rome where he had stayed before the papal conclave to pick up his luggage and settle his bill. "He paid the bill to set a good example," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said. Driven around Rome in a Vatican car without an escort, Francis also showed up at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore   with little notice to offer a bouquet of flowers and pray.

Better wolf's clothing or cross dressing than no clothes at all. The worst mistake that the Bush Administration makes is to continually insult the majority of voters; and we have heard quite enough from the Jesuit jingler. GEORGE YORG Playa del Rey

Guyana's left-wing government has deported a British-born Jesuit priest who defied an order to leave the country by Dec. 31, church officials said here Thursday. Father Patrick Conners, 51, who has lived in Guyana since 1966, was ordered to leave the former British colony last month amid worsening relations between church and state.

For the first time in history, the Roman Catholic Church has a pope from the New World, but liberal American Catholics should not expect Pope Francis to stray far from the old theology. Some things are excitingly different about this new pontiff. On matters of birth control, abortion, homosexuality, celibate priests and the role of women in the church, however, he is no revolutionary. When Argentina's Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio stepped out on the Vatican balcony as the new pope on Wednesday evening, all he was required to do was wave and give a blessing.

VATICAN CITY - Few people were more shocked at the choice of a Jesuit as pope than the Jesuits. There had never been a Jesuit pope before Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina was elected last week, and he was the only Jesuit among the 115 cardinals who voted in the papal conclave. (The only other one, from Indonesia, was too ill to attend.) Pope Francis, who will be installed formally Tuesday before more than 100 heads of state and foreign delegations, including Vice President Joe Biden and what will undoubtedly be an adoring crowd, has already shown himself to be a different kind of pope.

Re "Argentina's 'dirty war' wounds still raw," March 15 That Jorge Mario Bergoglio is the person I now have to address as Pope Francis is a very disturbing proposition for a person like me who survived Argentina's 'dirty war.' I wasn't surprised when the cardinals chose someone who has the conservative views of his predecessor, but it is astonishing that they selected a man who at best remained silent when Argentina's military kidnapped, tortured...

For the first time in history, the Roman Catholic Church has a pope from the New World, but liberal American Catholics should not expect Pope Francis to stray far from the old theology. Some things are excitingly different about this new pontiff. On matters of birth control, abortion, homosexuality, celibate priests and the role of women in the church, however, he is no revolutionary. When Argentina's Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio stepped out on the Vatican balcony as the new pope on Wednesday evening, all he was required to do was wave and give a blessing.

VATICAN CITY -- The Jesuits gave a warm welcome Thursday to the election of Pope Francis, the first pope from their order, and suggested that he will be committed to evangelizing and to reforming the Roman Catholic Church. The election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio on Wednesday as pope “opens a path full of hope,” the Jesuits' superior general, Father Adolfo Nicolas, said in a statement released Thursday. [For the Record, 11:20 a.m. March 14: An earlier version of this post gave the last name of Father Adolfo Nicolas as Nicolais.

As a Jesuit, Pope Francis comes from a religious order that traditionally shuns such high office - one key reason the Argentine is the first Jesuit to lead the vast Roman Catholic Church, scholars say. “We don't usually feel called to do that,” said Father T. Frank Kennedy, director of the Jesuit Institute at Boston College. “In our final vows, we promise not to seek church offices. It's only when the Holy Father orders us to do it that we accept.” Avoiding such ecclesiastical honors is one major trait of the Jesuits, formally known as the Society of Jesus.

VATICAN CITY - In a busy first full day as head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis on Thursday showed that he intends to shun the trappings of high office and introduce a humble note to the papacy. The 76-year-old pontiff returned to the clerical residence in Rome where he had stayed before the papal conclave to pick up his luggage and settle his bill. "He paid the bill to set a good example," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said. Driven around Rome in a Vatican car without an escort, Francis also showed up at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore   with little notice to offer a bouquet of flowers and pray.

Two Roman Catholic priests were slain in the apartment where they lived in an upmarket district of Moscow, investigators said. Victor Betancourt, a Jesuit priest from Ecuador, was killed in the apartment Saturday and Otto Messmer, a Russian who led the country's Jesuits, was killed there two days later after returning from a trip out of the country, their order said in Rome. The two priests had head injuries, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Prosecutor-General's Office said in a statement.

Re "Cloak of Silence Covered Abuse at Jesuit Retreat," March 24: Surely there must be a mistake! Can Fathers Thomas Smolich and Greg Aherne, current and former Jesuit superiors, really subscribe to the ethical position that they need not report to authorities molestations of mentally impaired human beings under their watch because the victims are not minors? How can they ethically justify sending sexual predators to live at Bellarmine High School and Santa Clara University, where adolescents are the majority population?

VATICAN CITY - From his willingness to cook his own meals and get around by bus, to his choice of St. Francis as inspiration for his name, the new pope has stressed humility and a simple life that could signal a change in tone at the center of the Roman Catholic Church. Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires, 76, is the first person from the Americas and the first Jesuit to be elected pope. The son of a railway worker, he rose to become regional superior of the Jesuit order in Argentina and then an archbishop, spending most of his career teaching priests and advocating for the poor through times of economic crisis in his home nation.

Roman Catholic cardinals chose Jorge Mario Bergoglio as pope Wednesday, selecting the Argentine Jesuit to succeed Pope Benedict XVI, who resigned Feb. 28, and lead 1.2 billion church followers around the globe. He was chosen after five rounds of voting in the Sistine Chapel. Bergoglio, who chose the papal name Francis I, is the first Jesuit pope and has spent nearly his entire career in Argentina, overseeing churches and shoe-leather priests. The Associated Press described him as a modernizer who has lived austerely.