Go, set the world alight

Go, set the world alight has been the Indonesian Jesuit slogan for 2009. This year marks the 150th anniversary of the most recent Jesuit presence in Indonesia. The phrase, which comes from Decree 2 of the 35th Jesuit General Congregation, provided the theme for the retreat in daily life made by all Indonesian Jesuits in preparation for the anniversary.

The words themselves go back to St Francis Xavier. When St Ignatius sent him to the East in 1541, he is said to have told him, ‘Go, set the world alight’.

Francis Xavier certainly began to set alight our region. He arrived in Molluca in 1546. Jesuits continued to work in the region from then until 1664. By then the Dutch East India Company had driven out the Portuguese from present-day Indonesia.

After the Restoration of the Society, the Bishop responsible for the East Indies asked for Jesuits to be sent to his territories. The Dutch province, re-established ten years earlier, accepted the mission.

On 9 July 1859 two young priests, Marinus van den Elzen and Joannes Baptist Palinckx, arrived in Batavia, now Jakarta. Over the coming years, the Dutch province sent almost one quarter of its members to work on the mission.

The early Jesuits spread widely through the islands, caring for the Christian communities there. The cost was often high. For example, Fr Joannes Meijer, an agronomist, arrived in Flores in 1864, but died of fever in the following year.

In the early decades of the 20th century the Society gave to other religious congregations responsibility for Flores and other islands. It consolidated its work in Java, in the present dioceses of Jakarta and Semarang.

The Jesuit commitment produced the greatest fruit in central Java. Javanese Catholics hold in especially high respect Fr van Driessche, Fr Strater and Fr Prennthaler.

Fr General Pedro Arrupe’s visit to Indonesia in 1971 was a turning point for Indonesian Jesuits. That year the region became an independent province. Fr Soenarja, a native-born Indonesian who had been vice-provincial since 1967, was the first Provincial. In April 1991, the Indonesian province was given responsibility for the Thailand and Malaysia-Singapore regions. The Indonesian province now comprises some 350 Jesuits, not including Jesuits who belong to Thailand and Malaysia-Singapore regions. It is the biggest province in the Assistancy of East Asia and Oceania. Its ministries range from social programs to academic institutions, and from pastoral care in parishes, to chaplaincy among labourers.

Greg Soetomo SJ