Canisius, << kuh NIHSH ee uhs, >> Saint Peter (1524-1597), was the founder of the first German house of Jesuits. He was also the foremost promoter of the reform of the Roman Catholic Church in south German lands. Saint Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits (also known as the Society of Jesus), sent Canisius as a missionary to help check the spread of Lutheranism in Germany. There, Canisius founded Jesuit colleges to meet the need for educated Roman Catholics.
Canisius’s most effective tool in strengthening the Roman Catholic faith was his Summa Doctrinae Christianae (1555), a catechism with more than 200 editions in 12 languages. His teaching and preaching contributed greatly to halting the spread of Protestantism in Germany, Austria, and Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic). Canisius was born on May 8, 1524, in Nijmegen, now in the Netherlands. He died on Dec. 21, 1597. He was canonized in 1925. His feast day is April 27.
