Pontifical Gregorian University

Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus, established a School of Grammar, Humanities, and Christian Doctrine (Scuola di grammatica, d'umanità e di Dottrina cristiana) in Rome on 18 February 1551. It was located in a building at the base of the Capitoline Hill, on what is today the Piazza d'Aracoeli.[6] Francis Borgia, the viceroy of Catalonia and a Catholic patron, provided financial support for the new school.

With a small library connected to it, the school was called the Roman College (Collegio Romano). In September 1551, due to its increased enrollment, the college moved to a larger facility behind the Santo Stefano del Cacco Church in Rome. After only two years of operation, the Roman College had 250 graduates.

Ignatius of Loyola

In January 1556, Pope Paul IV authorized the Roman College to confer academic degrees in theology and philosophy, elevating it to the rank of university. During the following 20 years, ever increasing enrollment forced the college to move to larger facilities twice. During this period, the college added chairs in moral philosophy and Arabic to the existing chairs in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.

When the college reached an enrollment of 1000 students, Pope Gregory XIII decided to build it a more expansive facility. He expropriated two city blocks in Rome near the Via del Corso and commissioned the architect Bartolomeo Ammannati to design a new building. The new college building was inaugurated in 1584 in what became known as the Piazza Collegio Romano, across from the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj. In gratitude for Gregory XIII's sponsorship, the college administration lauded him as its "founder and father" and renamed the Roman College as the Gregorian University.

The new space at Piazza Collegio Romano allowed the Gregorian University to add chairs of church history and liturgy. The Gregorian soon became known for its work in mathematics, physics and astronomy. Christopher Clavius, then a professor at the Gregorian, developed the Gregorian calendar that is still used worldwide today. The Jesuit mathematician Athanasius Kircher also later taught at the Gregorian. Not long after its Piazza Collegio Romano site opened, the Gregorian had 2000 students. Due to the limited size of its chapel, the Gregorian started rebuilding it in 1626 as the Church of Sant'Ignazio. Completed in 1650, the church is considered one of the major Baroque churches in the Rome area.

Roman College

Current site of the Gregorian University

In 1773, following the suppression of the Society of Jesus throughout Europe, the Jesuits were forced to cede control over the Gregorian University to the Diocese of Rome. However, Pope Leo XII returned the Gregorian to Jesuit control on 17 May 1824 after the reestablishment of the Society of Jesus.

With the Capture of Rome in 1870, Rome and the Papal States were incorporated into the new Kingdom of Italy. The new government of Italy then confiscated the Gregorian property and building, converting it into the Ennio Quirino Visconti Liceo Ginnasio. The Gregorian was forced to move into a much smaller facility at the Palazzo Gabrielli-Borromeo on Via del Seminario in Rome. Due to its lack of space, the Gregorian was forced to drop all of its faculties except for theology and philosophy. Enrollment dropped to under 250 students by 1875.

Pope Pius IX later granted the Gregorian the title "Pontifical University". In 1876, the Faculty of Canon Law was transferred from the University of Rome La Sapienza to the Gregorian, and the university gradually resumed the teaching of other disciplines. After World War I, Pope Benedict XV and his successor, Pope Pius XI, worked to create a new campus for the Gregorian at the base of Quirinal Hill, adjacent to the Pontifical Biblical Institute (Biblicum).[7] Pius XI laid the first stone for the new campus on 27 December 1924. Designed by architect Giulio Barluzzi in Neoclassical style, it was completed by 1930. After moving to the new campus, the Gregorian continued to expand to new faculties and disciplines as well as to add new buildings. The Pontifical Institute Regina Mundi, dedicated to the theological formation of women, opened in 1955 and closed in 2005.[8][9]

The Gregorian University is one of three member institutes that make up the Gregorian Consortium; the other two institutions are the Pontifical Biblical Institute (founded in 1909) and the Pontifical Oriental Institute (founded in 1917).[7] The Consortium was created under Pope Pius XI, in 1928.

The Pontifical Gregorian University has six faculties, three institutes and five centres, all of which offer academic degrees.

• Faculties:
  • Canon Law (minors: Matrimonial Jurisprudence, Penal Jurisprudence)
  • History and Cultural Heritage of the Church (majors: Cultural Heritage of the Church, History of the Church)
  • Missiology (minors: Missio Ad Gentes, New Evangelization, Theology of Religions)
  • Philosophy (minors: Practical Philosophy, Theoretical Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion)
  • Social Sciences (majors: Social Communication, Social Doctrine of the Church, Sociology, Leadership and Management)
  • Theology (majors: Biblical Theology, Dogmatic Theology, Fundamental Theology, Moral Theology, Patristic, Comparative Christian Theology, Spiritual Theology, Vocational Theology)

Aula magna (great hall) at Gregorian University (1930)

• Institutes:
  • Anthropology (former Centre for Child Protection)
  • Psychology
  • Spirituality
• Centres:
  • Centre "Alberto Hurtado" for Faith and Culture
  • Centre "Cardinal Bea" for Judaic Studies
  • Centre "Saint Peter Favre" for Formators to the Priesthood and Religious Life
  • Gregorian Centre for Interreligious Studies
  • Ignatian Spirituality Centre

Through the Gregorian Consortium, students are also able to pursue courses in the two Pontifical Institutes.

• Pontifical Biblical Institute:
  • Faculty of Ancient Near Eastern Studies
  • Faculty of Sacred Scriptures
• Pontifical Oriental Institute:
  • Faculty of Eastern Canon Law
  • Faculty of Eastern Ecclesiastical Sciences (majors: History, Liturgy, Patristics)

The three libraries of the Gregorian Consortium contain nearly 1.2 million volumes,[7] with large collections in the fields of theology, philosophy, culture and literature. The original Roman College library was founded in 1556. In 1872, the Gregorian library's 45,000 volumes, manuscripts, and archives were confiscated by the new Italian state; they were dispersed, with some of the collection going to the new Rome National Central Library.

Since 1928, the Gregorian library has been located on the Gregorian campus at Quirinal Hill. The majority of the library's collection, 820,000 volumes, is housed in a six-floor tower adjacent to the Palazzo Centrale. An additional 60,000 volumes are housed in the six reading rooms, which together seat 400 students. The library's reserve contains many ancient and precious books as well as rare editions, including 80 books from the 16th century.

The Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University (APUG) contain Jesuit records from the founding of the Roman College in 1551 to the suppression of the Jesuits in 1773. APUG has over 5,000 manuscripts for teaching rhetoric, grammar, philosophy and theology along with research on Greek and Latin classics, astronomy, mathematics, physics, Latin, Greek, Hebrew and Arabic.

Many of the APUG manuscripts were copied by auditores, others are autographs of masters such as Famiano Strada, Christopher Clavius, Francisco Suarez, Roberto Bellarmino, Mutio Vitelleschi, Roger Joseph Boscovich, Juan Bautista Villalpando, Francisco de Toledo. In some cases, these lesson notes gave origin to important works, like the Bellarmino's Controversie, of which APUG owns a copy with a lot of handwritten notes by the author. Other important documents at APUG include Athanasius Kircher's correspondence, the Christopher Clavius's correspondence or the codex used by Francesco Sforza Pallavicino to write his Istoria del Concilio di Trento.

Many miscellaneous documents at APUG highlight the relations between the Roman College and many of the Jesuits in mission around the world. These documents provide insight on the Church Reforms, the grace or moral debates, the Jansenist polemic and Chinese rites. APUG also contains documentation about the teaching activity from the 19th century until today: it is the official repository for all the professors who have taught at the Gregorian since 1873. This also includes documents on the First Vatican Council and the Second Vatican Council.

• Analecta Gregoriana
• Documenta Missionalia
• Miscellanea e storia pontificia
• Tesi gregoriana
• Canon Law
• Phylosphy
• Missiology
• Spirituality
• Ecclesiastical History
• Teologia
• Interreligious Investigations
• Philosophia

• Analecta Biblica
• Biblica et orientalia
• Studia Pohl (Series Maior)
• Subsidia biblica