The Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits, is a religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church. Headquartered in Rome, it was founded i
Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits
A fresco depicting Ignatius receiving the papal bull from Pope Paul III was created after 1743 by Johann Christoph Handke in the Church of Our Lady Of the Snow in Olomouc.
Jesuits at Akbar's court in India, c. 1605
The Catholic Church, also called the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with an estimated 1.28 to 1.41 billion baptized members worldwide as of 2026. It consists of 24 autonomous
St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, the largest Catholic church building in the world
The first use of the term "Catholic Church", meaning "universal church", was by the Church Father Saint Ignatius of Antioch in his Letter to the Smyrnaeans in c. 110 AD. Ignatius of Antioch also is credited with the first recorded use of the term Christianity ten years earlier, in c. 100 AD. He died in Rome, with his relics located in San Clemente al Laterano.
A c. 1481–1482 fresco by Pietro Perugino in the Sistine Chapel showing Jesus giving the keys of heaven to Saint Peter
The Last Supper in the Santa Maria delle Grazie Church in Milan, Italy, a late 1490s mural painting by Leonardo da Vinci, depicting the Last Supper of Jesus and his twelve apostles, depicts the final meal of Jesus before his crucifixion and death.