Slicing it Thin

Abstract

Over six hundred years ago, the Blessed John Colombini of Siena founded a new religious order, originally devoted to nursing and burying the victims of the rampant bubonic plague that swept away more than a third of the population of Europe. The group, known as the Jesuats (in no way related to the Jesuits—which at the time had not yet been founded), was officially approved by Pope Urban V in 1367. As time went on, the order declined, and in 1606 a partially successful attempt was made to revive the group. But certain abuses, apparently involving the manufacture and sale of distilled liquors in a manner not sanctioned by Canon Law, crept in. This, along with a difficulty in maintaining a reasonable membership quota, led to the order’s abolishment by Pope Clement IX in 1668. The order had existed for just over three hundred years.