Saint Peter Canisius (1521-1597)

The Catholic collapse in German lands

Peter Canisius was born in 1521, the very year Luther, appearing before the Diet of Worms, refused to recant before Charles V. Within a generation, the Protestant Reformation had carried off entire sections of the Empire: principalities gone over to Lutheranism, emptied monasteries, pulpits occupied by preachers of the new doctrine, a people deprived of religious instruction. In many towns, no trained priests could be found any longer, and the Catholic faith was barely passed on. It was into this world in the process of coming apart that Providence would throw the young man from Nijmegen.^[7][8]

The Society of Jesus, young and fragile

The Society of Jesus, founded by Saint Ignatius of Loyola and approved by Paul III in 1540, still numbered only a handful of members when Canisius joined it. Its mission was clear: to defend and spread the faith through preaching, spiritual direction and above all teaching. Within a few decades, its colleges would cover Catholic Europe in a network; but in 1543, everything remained to be built. Canisius would be one of those who, on the most exposed terrain — Germany — transformed this young spiritual army into a force of reconquest.^[9][10]

Birth in Nijmegen (1521)

Peter Canisius was born on 8 May 1521 in Nijmegen, capital of the Duchy of Guelders, into a notable family.^[11][12] His father, Jacob Kanis (Jacques Canisius), an esteemed jurist, was nine times burgomaster of the town and tutor to the children of the House of Lorraine; his mother, Gilette van Houweningen, died while he was still a small child. Raised partly by a pious aunt, the boy showed very early a singular inclination to prayer. In his Confessions — a spiritual autobiography he would later compose in imitation of Saint Augustine — he records his tears as a child before the tabernacle of St Stephen's church in Nijmegen:

"Little child though I was, O my God, yet mature beyond my age by an effect of Your mercy, I had light enough to know that I must turn to You for what concerned my salvation. […] Prostrate at the foot of Your altars in the church of St Stephen in Nijmegen, I invoked Your holy name with many tears, and I laid before You all my desires and all my troubles." — Saint Peter Canisius, Confessions^[13]

Cologne and the meeting with Nicholas van Esch

At thirteen, Canisius was sent to the University of Cologne, then a great Catholic stronghold but threatened from within. Providence provided him a safeguard: the holy priest Nicholas van Esch (Eschius), a spiritual master close to the Carthusians and to Rheno-Flemish mysticism, took charge of his conduct.^[14] Under his direction, Canisius pursued brilliant studies alongside an intense life of piety — frequent confession, daily reading of the Gospel and the lives of the saints, prayer. He earned his Master of Arts in 1540, at nineteen. All his life, he would keep a moved gratitude for this first spiritual father:

"Bless the Lord, O my soul, and never forget His goodness, for having been pleased to give you such a master to form you in piety, who, with no regard for his own interests, sought only your salvation." — Saint Peter Canisius, Confessions, on Nicholas van Esch^[15]

The vow of chastity and the refusal of marriage

Informed of the merit of this only son, his father thought of calling him back to Nijmegen, marrying him advantageously and settling him in the world — a fine match even presented itself. But Canisius bore "a nobler ambition". Resolved to give his heart to God "wholly, so that no creature might ever share it", he pronounced a vow of perpetual chastity on 2 February, in his twentieth year.^[16] His father, a virtuous man, did not force his son's inclination. To guard himself against the vainglory that learning risked inspiring in so brilliant a mind, the young man kept, tradition says, a death's head on his study table — "the book that never flattered him".^[17]

The decisive meeting with Peter Faber (1543)

Everything changed when Canisius heard of Fr Peter Faber (Pedro Fabro), the first companion of Saint Ignatius, then passing through Mainz. Seized by an interior presentiment, he set out to join him, made the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius under his direction, and came out transformed.^[18][19] Even before completing the retreat, he was convinced that God was calling him into the Society. He committed himself to it by vow on his very birthday, 8 May 1543: he was twenty-two, and thus became the first Jesuit from the Netherlands.^[20][21]

Novitiate and patristic labours

After two years of novitiate at Louvain, in Faber's own house, Canisius resumed his studies and teaching at Cologne with redoubled ardour.^[22] Tireless, he lectured on the Gospel and the epistles of Saint Paul, preached, catechized — and still found time to produce corrected editions of the Fathers of the Church: Saint Cyril of Alexandria (two volumes) and the works of Saint Leo the Great.^[23] This twofold gift — the soundest erudition and the most burning pastoral zeal — would mark his whole life.

Ordination and the fight for Cologne

Ordained priest in 1546 by a Catholic bishop — a grace he expressly notes at a time when the faith of several German prelates was becoming suspect^[24] — Canisius at once found himself drawn into a decisive struggle. The Archbishop of Cologne, Hermann von Wied, won over to the new ideas, threatened to tip the whole province into Protestantism. Alongside the theologian Johann Gropper and supported by the nuncio, the young Jesuit deployed a "truly apostolic" zeal to defend the faith of the city; he was even entrusted with a mission to Charles V.^[25] Cologne remained Catholic.

The Council of Trent (1547)

Canisius's reputation had already crossed borders. He was summoned as a theologian to the Council of Trent, in the service of Cardinal Otto Truchsess von Waldburg, Bishop of Augsburg.^[26][27] There he took part in the congregation of theologians, sharing the learning of the first Fathers of the Society — Laínez, Salmerón, Le Jay — and participated, from within, in the immense work of doctrinal definition that would raise the Church up again. From the Council he went on to Bologna, then, at Ignatius's order, to Rome.

With Saint Ignatius

In Rome, Canisius spent five whole months under the direct guidance of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, who formed him "in all the practices of the interior life" before sending him on his great mission.^[28] To test his obedience, Ignatius asked him to set down in writing the disposition of his heart. Canisius's reply, preserved in the archives of the Society, tells of the total abandonment in which he had placed himself:

"I bind myself by an express vow, which I make to my God without turning back and without reserve, never to procure for myself anything that might contribute to my comfort, whether in employments or in places of residence; leaving once and for all and forever this entire right to my father in Jesus Christ, Father Ignatius, to whom I remit wholly the conduct of my soul and the care of my body." — Saint Peter Canisius, written profession given to Saint Ignatius, 1547^[29]

The grace of St Peter's

It was on returning to Rome, in 1549, shortly before his departure for Germany, that Canisius received the mystical grace that would orient his whole life. On 2 September 1549, after visiting Pope Paul III at Castel Gandolfo, he went to pray at St Peter's Basilica and implored the help of the apostles Peter and Paul for his mission; he notes in his spiritual journal having felt "great consolation and the presence of grace" granted by these intercessors.^[30] Two days later, on 4 September 1549, he recorded the mystical experience that would orient his whole life: an opening of the Heart of Christ, from which he emerged strengthened for his mission. He left a testimony of rare intensity, more than a century before Saint Margaret Mary would receive the great revelations of the Sacred Heart:

"Thou, at last, as if opening to me the Heart of Thy Most Holy Body, which I seemed to see before me, didst command me to drink from this fount, inviting me to draw the waters of my salvation from Thy springs, O my Saviour." — Saint Peter Canisius, spiritual journal, 4 September 1549^[31]

According to the same tradition, the Saviour then gave him as it were a garment composed of three elements — peace, love and perseverance — with which Canisius would clothe himself throughout his work of Catholic renewal.^[32] This devotion to the Heart of Christ, source of apostolic strength, would remain the interior secret of the Apostle of Germany. Before sending him into battle, Ignatius had him pronounce his solemn vows as a professed Father of the four vows.^[33]

On 9 February 2011, devoting an entire general audience to Canisius, Pope Benedict XVI would stress what he held to be the saint's distinctive trait: his ability to "harmoniously combine fidelity to dogmatic principles with the respect due to every person".^[34]

Ingolstadt: Rector of the university

Canisius's first German mission was Bavaria, where Duke William IV was asking for labourers to rebuild his university. Ignatius sent three Jesuits there — Le Jay, Salmerón and Canisius — who took charge of the University of Ingolstadt.^[35] Canisius became its rector, then vice-chancellor. His teaching — clear, gentle, accessible — drew crowds to his "familiar instructions"; he revived teaching, rekindled the practice of the sacraments, and made Ingolstadt a hearth of Catholic reconquest.^[36]

Vienna: the administrator of the diocese who refused the episcopate

Summoned next to Vienna by King Ferdinand I, Canisius found a bloodless Church: for nearly twenty years, the city had not seen a single ordination, and entire parishes remained without a priest.^[37] He preached at court and at the cathedral, visited hospitals and prisons, assisted plague victims at the peril of his life, and catechized children with his own hands. Faced with such merit, the king wanted to make him Bishop of Vienna; Canisius, faithful to the spirit of the Society which forbids seeking dignities, refused the episcopate and accepted only to administer the vacant diocese, for a time, without bearing its title.^[38][39]

The Colloquy of Worms and the mission to Poland (1557)

Even before his Augsburg ministry, Canisius was engaged on two major diplomatic fronts. On the mandate of the Catholic princes and at the pope's order, he took part in 1557 in the religious discussions of the Colloquy of Worms, where he repeatedly opposed Philip Melanchthon as champion of the Catholic party, and preached in the city's cathedral; the Protestants' persistent disagreement among themselves at this colloquy owed, in good part, to his doctrinal firmness.^[40][41] Shortly after, Pope Paul IV sent him, with Nuncio Mentuati, to Poland, to the imperial diet of Piotrków; at Kraków, he addressed the clergy and the members of the university.^[42][43]

Augsburg and preaching

Canisius then became the preacher of Augsburg Cathedral (1559-1568), a great imperial city and one of the hottest fronts between Catholics and Protestants.^[44] His word, firm but without bitterness, brought crowds back to communion; he is seen confessing, catechizing, visiting tirelessly. There as everywhere, his method was not brutal polemic, but patient teaching and the example of charity.

First Provincial of Upper Germany (1556)

In 1556, Saint Ignatius erected a new province of the Society for Upper Germany and appointed Canisius its first provincial — an office he would hold for thirteen years (1556-1569).^[45][46] From Vienna to Prague, from Ingolstadt to Munich, he travelled ceaselessly over an immense territory, founding and sustaining colleges that would become the nurseries of the German Catholic clergy. The table below summarizes a few of these foundations.

It was precisely at Dillingen that, a few years later, Canisius — a fine discerner of souls — would test the vocation of the young Saint Stanislaus Kostka before sending him to Rome with a letter of recommendation: one of the finest links in the chain of holiness of the first Society.^[47]

The Greater Catechism (Summa doctrinae christianae, 1555)

The work by which Canisius most deeply marked history is his catechism. Aware that the Christian people were being lost for want of instruction, and that the Protestants had known how to spread their own catechisms, he composed the Summa doctrinae christianae — the "Sum of Christian Doctrine" — published in 1555.^[48][49] A dense work, intended for students and cultivated minds, it sets out the whole Catholic faith in an ordered way, by questions and answers, around Christian wisdom and justice — faith, hope, charity, the sacraments, the commandments.

Catechisms for every age

Aware that a single book could not suit all, Canisius provided several versions adapted to each age: the Greater Catechism for formed minds; an intermediate catechism for adolescents — the very one the young Saint Aloysius Gonzaga read, they say, in his childhood; and a little catechism for children, enriched with prayers.^[50] The success was immense and lasting: there are reckoned over two hundred editions in the saint's lifetime, and over four hundred editions by the end of the seventeenth century, in some fifteen languages.^[51][52] For three centuries, in German lands, "the Canisius" became synonymous with catechism — to the point that to learn one's religion was to "learn one's Canisius".^[53]

A method: persuading rather than polemicizing

The pastoral genius of Canisius was to understand that Germany would not be won back by invective, but by clarity and charity. Where others answered the Protestants with bitter polemic, he preferred the serene exposition of the faith, persuaded that an honest and benevolent presentation touched hearts more:

"If they are treated well, the Germans will give everything. […] An honest explanation of the faith would be far more effective than a polemical attack." — Saint Peter Canisius, on the pastoral method in German lands^[54]

This evangelical moderation, joined to flawless doctrinal firmness, explains why so many towns and families returned to the Catholic faith without having been antagonized by controversy.

Against the Magdeburg Centuries

Canisius was nonetheless no stranger to doctrinal combat. When Lutheran theologians published the Magdeburg Centuries, a vast history of the Church written to prove that Rome had corrupted primitive Christianity, he answered not with a point-by-point refutation, but with great historical and doctrinal monographs: a work on Saint John the Baptist and another, considerable one on the Virgin Mary (De Maria Virgine incomparabili).^[55] To the falsification of history, he opposed the documented truth of the sources.

Marian devotion

The whole spiritual life of Canisius is traversed by love of the Virgin Mary. A pilgrim to Loreto, a defender of Marian devotion then under attack by the reformers, he helped spread the second part of the Hail Mary — the invocation "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us…" — in the form that would become universal.^[56] His great Marian work, De Maria Virgine incomparabili, remains one of the monuments of the Marian theology of the Catholic Reformation.

A man of the Confessions

In imitation of Saint Augustine, Canisius composed Confessions — a spiritual journal in which he rereads his whole life as a sequence of graces. Beneath the great organizer, one discovers a soul of profound humility and tenderness, perpetually turned toward God. It is in these pages that we read of his tears as a child, his gratitude toward his masters, and the grace of the Heart of Christ — proof that all his overflowing action welled up from a hidden interior life.^[57][58]

The humility of the scholar

Gifted with a prodigious memory and penetration, Canisius dreaded above all the vainglory that learning breeds. Faithful to Saint Paul's word — "knowledge puffs up" — he wished to be "as small in his own eyes as he appeared great in the eyes of others".^[59] His intellectual motto, inherited from Nicholas van Esch, sums up all his wisdom:

"To be ignorant of all else, but to know Jesus Christ perfectly, is to be ignorant of nothing, it is to know all things; anything other than serving God is but deception and falsehood." — Saint Peter Canisius, after his master Nicholas van Esch^[60]

The tireless servant

The life of Canisius is a living refutation of the idea that holiness is incompatible with the hardest labour. Ceaseless journeys, foundations, preaching, letters by the thousand, books, counsel to Catholic princes, care of plague victims: for fifty years he bore the weight of the German reconquest. It is precisely this mass of work — studied from the Jesuit archives by the greatest of his modern biographers, Fr James Brodrick, S.J. — that makes his interior life all the more remarkable: far from a mere organizer, Brodrick shows a man whose intense outward activity rested entirely on a disciplined life of prayer, retraced archive by archive rather than by pure hagiography.^[61] This activity never overflowed prayer; following the counsel once received from Fr Le Jay, he strove to "give himself to prayer in such a way that study might be sustained by it", and vice versa.^[62]

St Michael's College

In 1580, aged and weakened, Canisius was sent to Fribourg, in Switzerland, then at the confines of the Catholic and Protestant worlds. Far from resting, he deployed there a final masterwork: the foundation of St Michael's College (1582), which would help keep Fribourg in the Catholic faith and become one of the great Jesuit establishments of Europe.^[63][64] There he still preached, wrote, directed souls, despite the infirmities of age.

The last days (1597)

Struck by paralysis in his final years, Canisius continued to dictate and to pray. He died at Fribourg on 21 December 1597, at seventy-six, surrounded by the veneration of the whole city.^[65][66] His body was buried in St Nicholas Church, then transferred to the church of St Michael's College, where it rests. The reputation for holiness that had surrounded him in his lifetime only grew after his death.

Beatification and canonization

The cause of Canisius was, as often, a long one. He was beatified on 20 November 1864 by Pope Pius IX.^[67] The crowning had to wait for the pontificate of Pius XI: on 21 May 1925, the pope canonized him and proclaimed him Doctor of the Church on the same day — an exceptional honour reserved for only a few saints.^[68][69] Some older notices give 21 June; the date retained by the pontifical acts is 21 May 1925.

Doctor of the Church and "Second Apostle of Germany"

In making him a Doctor of the Church, Pius XI acknowledged that the work of Canisius — his catechisms, his Marian theology, his editions of the Fathers, his preaching — had nourished the faith of the universal Church. Tradition has bestowed on him another title, more popular still: that of "Second Apostle of Germany", successor of Saint Boniface.^[70] In fact, without Canisius, entire regions of the Empire would doubtless have remained definitively lost to Catholicism.

Legacy

Saint Peter Canisius remains the patron of German catechists and one of the models of the pedagogy of the faith. His lesson is crystal-clear: a people is not saved by polemic alone, but by patiently reteaching it its faith, from the most learned to the smallest child. The great organizer, the learned editor of the Fathers, the theologian of the Virgin was first a catechist; and it was through the catechism — the humble book of questions and answers — that he restored Germany's Christian memory.

Two popes, a century apart, solemnly revisited this work. For the third centenary of his death, in 1897, Pope Leo XIII devoted to Canisius the encyclical Militantis Ecclesiae, addressed to the bishops of Austria, Germany and Switzerland, in which he noted that, in popular speech, "knowing one's Canisius" had become synonymous with "keeping the Christian faith", and praised in him the union of the "weapons of knowledge" and the "weapons of justice" in the service of the Church.^[71] For the fourth centenary, in 1997, Pope John Paul II in turn wrote to the bishops of Germany, hailing the "Second Apostle of Germany" and recalling his constant care for the youngest:

"Christ, the Wisdom of God Himself, did not shy away from children, but treated them with trust." — Saint Peter Canisius, quoted by John Paul II, letter to the bishops of Germany, 19 September 1997^[72]

"Thou, at last, as if opening to me the Heart of Thy Most Holy Body, didst command me to drink from this fount." — Saint Peter Canisius, spiritual journal, 4 September 1549^[73]

• Saint Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556) — the founder of the Society of Jesus, who formed and sent Canisius.
• The Foundation of the Society of Jesus (1521-1556) — the order of which Canisius was the first Jesuit of the Netherlands.
• Saint Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621) — the other great Jesuit Doctor of the Church, theologian of the Catholic Reformation.
• Saint Stanislaus Kostka (1550-1568) — the young Jesuit whose vocation Canisius tested at Dillingen.
• Saint Charles Borromeo (1538-1584) — the reforming bishop, another great figure of the Catholic Reformation.
• The Council of Trent (1545-1563) — the council at which Canisius served as theologian.
• The Catholic Reformation — the great movement of regeneration of which he was a major artisan in Germany.