The Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges ed. by Thomas Banchoff and José Casanova

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges ed. by Thomas Banchoff and José Casanova Karin Vélez The Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges. Edited by Thomas Banchoff and José Casanova. (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. 2016. Pp. viii, 299. $64.95 clothbound; $32.95 paperback. ISBN 978-1-62616-286-0.) This volume of essays could not be more timely for a political moment when many countries seem poised to resurrect nationalism. It offers "Lessons for Today" (p. 280) centered on the question: "Is the experience of Jesuits as global missionaries and educators for almost five centuries relevant to the challenges we face today . . . [in] an increasingly multipolar and interconnected world?" (p. vii). The answer is a resounding and inspiring yes. The seven eminent Jesuits and five senior scholars who convened four workshops to refine these essays have produced an impressively researched catalogue of how Jesuits have responded and contributed to the phenomenon of globalization over time. While the book features "Historical" prominently in the title and is organized chronologically into "Part I: Historical Perspectives" and "Part II: Contemporary Challenges," it shines most in addressing and [End Page 325] contextualizing current Jesuit initiatives to engage with the world. That said, it is a testament to the Jesuit "way of proceeding" that the contributors—Jesuit and otherwise—are hypercritical of Jesuit shortcomings in this endeavor. Cumulatively, these essays highlight four globalizing projects associated with the Society: accommodation, education, interreligious dialogue, and social justice. In "The Jesuits in East Asia. . . ," M. Antoni Ucerler, S.J., describes the most famous historical examples of Jesuit accommodation or inculturation in Japan and China. There, Ucerler notes that Jesuit policy developed not simply thanks to Jesuit understandings but as a pragmatic response to pressures from Japanese and Christian interlocutors (p. 29). Aliocha Maldavsky, in "Jesuits in Ibero-America. . . ," surveys the variety of different Jesuit missions to Spanish and Portuguese America while stressing how Jesuits accommodated not only to indigenous societies but also to colonial political regimes that constrained Jesuit outreach (p. 103). In "Historical Perspectives on Jesuit Education. . . ," John O'Malley, S.J., argues that Jesuit colleges stand as a "corrective to the predominantly economic model" of globalization because they emphasized "more humane . . . working together for the common good" (p. 164). His proof of this is today's extensive network of Jesuit schools staffed by local personnel (p. 147), though he devotes the bulk of his essay to grounding the development of Jesuit schools in the early modern period and the Renaissance humanistic tradition. O'Malley is corroborated by Thomas Banchoff in "Jesuit Higher Education and the Global Common Good." Banchoff also stresses that what makes today's 150 Jesuit universities distinct from other globally-minded institutions is the international reach and extent of collaboration (pp. 253–54). In "The Jesuits…At Vatican II. . . ," David Hollenbach, S.J., notes how Superior General Pedro Arrupe followed up on Vatican II policies by stressing social justice as central to Jesuit mission (p. 176). Hollenbach singles out Jesuits—including Cameroonian Englebert Mveng (p. 177), Aloysius Pieris in Sri Lanka, and Michael Amaladoss in India (p. 179)—for promoting cross-cultural dialogue. Also flagging a Jesuit groundbreaker for social justice, Maria Clara Lucchetti Bingemer describes Ignacio Ellacuría, S.J., martyr and human-rights activist in El Salvador, who pioneered "a globalization that is not dehumanizing but instead attentive to . . . the pursuit of justice" (p. 189). John Joseph Puthemkalam, S.J., and Drew Rau offer a group exemplar founded to rectify the economic imbalances caused by globalization: Jesuits in Social Action (JESA) in South Asia (p. 214). Lastly, Peter Balleis takes us to a transnational organization and the internet, describing the work of the Jesuit Refugee Service (p. 231) and the Jesuit Commons: Higher Education at the Margins (pp. 233–34), which since 2007 has brought online education to refugees unable to otherwise access university courses. Notwithstanding these increasingly intense projects of global engagement, the editors wisely caution readers against seeing globalization as linear progress or as "continuous [or] unidirectional" (p. 3). Four of the most interesting essays in the volume deal directly with backpeddling and setbacks in Jesuit globalizing endeavors. In "Jesuit...