Jan Roothaan

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The Very Reverend Jan Roothaan, S.J.

Jan Philipp Roothaan, S.J. (November 23, 1785 - May 8, 1853) was the twenty-first Superior-General of the Society of Jesus. He was born in Amsterdam to a once-Protestant family. The Roothaan family emigrated from Frankfort to Amsterdam, where it became Catholic. When Jan Philipp, the youngest of three brothers, was sixteen he graduated from the gymnasium of his native town. From there he passed to the athenaeum illustre (high school), and continued his classical studies for four years under Professor Jakob van Lennep and then joined the Society of Jesus, which still survived in Russia and had been officially recognized by Pope Pius VII. In 1804 he set out for the novitiate in Dunaburg. On the conclusion of his novitiate he was appointed teacher at the Jesuit gymnasium at Dunaburg from 1806 to 1809. He had already mastered Polish; as a native of Holland, he naturally also spoke French, while Latin, Greek, and Hebrew were among his favorite studies. He subsequently began studied philosophy and theology at Polotsk, and in 1812 was ordained priest.

The following four years were spent as professor of rhetoric at Pusza -- this was the stormy era of the Napoleonic Wars, the same time period that saw Pius VII restore the Jesuits. The other four years which preceded the banishment of the Jesuits from Russia (1820), Roothaan worked partly as teacher and partly in pastoral duties in Orsa. During this interval he took the final vows and entered exile. This journey lasted three months, and ended in Brig, Switzerland. Here he again taught rhetoric for three years. Roothaan was subsequently appointed to the rectorship of the newly-founded college at Turin and on the death of Luigi Fortis, General of the Society of Jesus, Roothaan was named his successor.

He is credited with preserving and strengthening the internal spirit of the society. To this object he devoted nine of his eleven general letters. He also worked on the new edition of the Exercises of St. Ignatius; providing an introduction and explanatory notes. In 1832 he published the Revised Order of Studies. During his administration, the order doubled the number of members to 5000 and increased its apostolic activity, although the order suffered banishment and persecution in many places, especially in the Revolutions of 1848. The general himself had to leave Rome for two years. On his return, his health was broken, his strength began to fail, and fits of weakness announced his approaching end.

Roothaan's biographer summed up his spirit well: Impetuous by nature, he governed all passions by the exercise of Christian self-denial, so that a most measured moderation in all things forms his distinctive characteristic.