Every July 31, the Church celebrates the feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus and master of discernment. For us, Daughters of Jesus, this day is not just another date on the liturgical calendar: it is an opportunity to give profound thanks for the gift of his life, his legacy and his spirituality, which are part of the heart of our charism.
A relationship born from the heart.
Saint Ignatius is a saint who inhabited the inner universe of Juana Josefa since her childhood. She met him through a majestic image in St. Mary of Toulouse, and her simple and restless soul felt the yearning to imitate him. That innocent desire was a seed that the Spirit would cultivate over the years. Ignatian spirituality became his school of life, his way of seeking and finding God in all things.
In 1868, when she met Fr. Miguel de San José Herranz, a Jesuit, the path was confirmed. Herranz would be her spiritual companion, her guide and firm support in the foundation of the Congregation of the Daughters of Jesus. Together they sensed that God wanted a new religious family inspired by the Ignatian spirit, dedicated to the Christian education of girls and young women.
It was at Rosarillo, on April 2, 1869, that the young Juana Josefa clearly received the will of God: to found a congregation under the name of Daughters of Jesus. The call of the eternal King, so central to the Spiritual Exercises, resounded in her soul and was boldly expressed in her own life: “I would go to the end of the world in search of souls”.
The Ignatian spirit in the Daughters of Jesus.
The number of Daughters of Jesus grew. The Foundress, with the help of Fr. Herranz and Fr. Bombardó, dedicated herself to form them in the spirit of the Institute. As a result of this spiritual impulse, she wrote the first Constitutions, inspired by the experience of the Rosarillo and approved by Bishop Lluch y Garriga in 1872. However, in the successive approvals essential elements were suppressed, among them that it should be an Ignatian religious congregation. M. Candida, from her love for the charism received, fought tirelessly for Constitutions faithful to the initial inspiration.
His insistence achieved something decisive: the recognition of Ignatian spirituality as the charism proper to the Congregation, as opposed to other proposals such as the Franciscan one. Although it was only after the Second Vatican Council, with the new Constitutions of 1983, that the spiritual and apostolic richness of the foundational charism could be expressed with greater freedom and fidelity, making explicit aspects that previously could not be fully named.
In these days when young FI pilgrims are in Rome, we cannot but recall those moments when M. Candida herself set foot on that holy land to fight for the recognition of what God had sown in her heart. Candida herself set foot on that holy land to fight for the recognition of what God had sown in her heart. Her passage through Rome was not in vain: it was a silent dedication, a fruitful sowing, another expression of her fidelity.
Thank you, San Ignacio
Since then, Ignatian spirituality has run through the charismatic veins of our Congregation: in the centrality of Christ, in obedience to the will of the Father, in the option for service to the most needy, in the importance of discernment and in the pedagogy of love that educates.
M. Candida knew how to transmit this heritage to us, not only with words, but with a whole life given to God. Confident, passionate for the Kingdom, obedient to the end. Today we give thanks for St. Ignatius, for his life offered to God and for how his spirituality continues to enrich our history and mission.
May his feast renew us in the desire to live more deeply our vocation as Daughters of Jesus, always seeking in everything, as he did, the greater glory of God.
