Mary Purcell - The Quiet Companion: The Life of Peter Faber (Peter Favre S.J., 1506-1546)

Peter Faber and Francis Xavier, room-mates at Paris University from 1525 to 1536, were the foundation stones upon which Ignatius Loyola built the Society of Jesus. The gentle and retiring Faber packed into the last seven of his forty years an incredible programme of travel and work. He was the Paris theologian in the retinue of the Emperor Charles V at Worms, Spires, Ratisbon and other cities where Lutherans and Catholics met for discussions that usually ended in futility and mutual recriminations.

During the fateful years preceding the Council of Trent, Fabers assignments brought him into contact with many famous contemporaries. His writings supply interesting sidelights on the situation in Germany, particularly in the Rhineland, and stamp him as an ecumenist born four centuries too soon; his observations on men and events were perceptive and tolerant. A humanist by formation, he pleaded for calm instead of fury, conciliation instead of condemnation, and concentration on moral reform rather than on theological controversy. In 1540 Peter Faber was saying, with little hope of being heeded, what Pope John said in 1960: Stress what brings men together, not that which divides them. He told those who sought his counsel that the religious situation in the sixteenth century was quite different from that of early Christian times. The primitive Church preached to pagans, the policy being to bring them first to belief and afterwards to a better moral life. The correct procedure in post-Renaissance Europe was, Faber held, for the Church to set her own house in order, for self-reform, individual and collective; then, purified and renewed, the faithful, by example and kindness, might endeavour to win back those who had left the fold.

In a letter to a Jesuit friend who asked his advice on how to deal with men who had abandoned Catholicism for newer religions, Faber reveals himself. This letter, written shortly before his death in 1546, answered the query:

Remember, if we want to be of help to them, we must be careful to regard them with love, to love them in deed and in truth, and to banish from our own souls any thought that might lessen our love and esteem for them.

We have to win their good will so that they will love us and readily confide in us. This can be done by speaking familiarly with them on subjects about which we agree, and by avoiding points of discussion that might give rise to argument; for argument usually ends in one side lording it over the other. Neither should we act towards the Lutherans as though they were pagans, but rather address ourselves to a mans will, to his heart, as a means of approaching with prudence matters of faith.

Before mentioning errors of belief, try to get those who are in bad faith and who are, at the same time, leading evil lives, to abandon their vices. I once visited a Lutheran who wanted to draw me into a discussion on priestly celibacy. I set myself out to win his confidence. Then he told me that for many years he himself was living with a woman. Little by little I persuaded him to give up that life and return to his former celibacy. Meanwhile I refrained from disputing matters of faith. As soon as he ceased sinning, his errors of faith vanished and he never even mentioned them again, they being nothing more than the result of the kind of life he had been leading.

Regarding good works, which the Lutherans say are not necessary, proceed ab ipsis operibus ad ipsam fidem, and always speak of the things that will rouse them to good works... try to move their souls, so that they will develop a liking for prayer, for good works, for the Mass. It is the loss of love for prayer that has caused many to lose the faith. Assure them that with the grace of God it is possible to keep the commandments and bear the trials of life. This is one point where ardent exhortation is needed to help them recover the hope and confidence they have lost. If Luther could be got to abandon his position and place himself once more under obedience, resuming the habit he has cast off, he would by that very act cease to be a heretic and there would be no need for further theological dispute. But, oh, what fortitude of spirit, what profound humility, what tremendous patience, what heavenly fire would be needed to bring that to pass...