The First Native Filipino Beaterio; The Beaterio de la Compania de Jesus now Congregation of the Religious of the Virgin Mary (RVM Sisters)

Ignacia comes from the Latin ignis, means fire.  She would be a fire of the Holy Spirit on a native soil. When she turned twenty-one in 1684, Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo (1663-1748) decided to leave home to pursue her calling as religious.  Her father, Jusepe Iuco was a Chinese convert from Amoy, China (now Xiamen) and her mother, Maria Jeronima, an India (native) Tagala.  Being their only surviving child out of four children, her parents wanted her to marry, but she stood firm on her decision to lead a consecrated life.  Upon the advice of a Jesuit priest, Father Paul Klein, a native of Bohemia , she went on a spiritual retreat for a greater self-discernment.  She was to emerge as a central figure in the Philippine monastic movement.  At first she decided to live by herself until, a year later, 'several poor Indias (natives)' began to join her in her humble home of prayer and work, the latter being mostly in the form of a needlework to support herself.  A pair of scissors and needle was the only thing she had taken with her from her parent's home.  Thus, she and her companions became the Filipino counterparts of the Spanish beatas  of the Beaterio de Santa Catalina de Sena in Intramuros.

The "soul" of the Beaterio de la Compania de Jesus, Mother Ignacia embodied the optimal blending of the three magnanimous traditions in her background: the spiritual leadership of women in the Malay culture; the distinction of "virtuous and  chaste women" as recorded in Chinese annals (fang-chih) since the fifth century, and the monastic tradition of Western women.  Mother Ignacia was also the first native beata to write the brief history of her foundation in 1726.  Her Spiritual journey would imprint her and her daughters upon the pages of Philippine religious history.

THE SPIRITUAL DIRECTION OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS
According to Mother Ignacia, writing in the third person, they " petitioned the Reverend Fathers of the Society of Jesus to help them in their desire to serve God.  Since then, the Jesuits have assisted them, encouraged them and showed them the way to perfection."  Since the Jesuits had neither a Second nor Third Order, the native Filipina beatas applied for the erection of a diocesan beaterio.  It was to be the only one of its kind in any Spanish colonies, which has endured up to the present.  Almost all the other religious houses for women were supervised by friars of religious Orders.  The only two other diocesan beaterios in the Philippines, that of Balingasag (1880) and Santa Maria Magdalena (1887) did not live on.

From what we have seen of the experience of the Spanish Beaterio de Santa Catalina, it was an agony even for influential Spanish ladies to achieve the goal of founding a beaterio.  How much more for poor native Filipino women ?  As Mother Ignacia's Jesuit biographer and contemporary, Father Pedro Murillo Velarde, observed; "She overcame the great difficulties which she met in this foundation from the beginning till the end."  It was unthinkable in the era for Filipino group to be formally recognized ahead of their Spanish counterparts.  Sor Christina Gonzales, her niece by a cousin, was the first beata to be admitted to the beaterio together with Sor Teodora de Jesus and Ana Margarita appeared as the three earliest followers of the foundress in the first extant list of members of the beaterio (18 July 1748) when Mother Ignacia was still living.

THE FIRST NATIVE FILIPINO BEATERIO
The Beaterio de la Compania de Jesus (now The Congregation of the Religious of the Virgin Mary) was named for its spiritual directors, the Society of Jesus.  Their plain edifice was built near the Jesuit Church in the Walled City.  Their constitution limited the membership to"pure Indias or mestizas and daughters of Chinese mestizas."  The third group-daughters of Chinese mestizas-had to be specified because by law, a Filipino woman followed the racial classification of her father only, and upon marriage that of her husband's.  Officially, the maternal branch was not taken into consideration as though it did not exist.  Thus the beaterio took a revolutionary step by recognizing the mother's lineage in its constitution.  A Spanish woman may gain admission with the approval of two thirds of the vote cast by all the perpetually professed beatas.  The beaterio is also the second enduring religious congregation for native women in Asia.  The first is the Amantes de la Croix (Lovers of the Holy Cross) which was started b in 1670 by Bishop Pierre Lambert de la Motte in Annam, Cochin China, now Vietnam.  The Filipino beatas were the first to be conferred the privilege of professing the simple vows of chastity and obedience.  Although the spirit of poverty was emphasized in their constitution and they lived in almost dire poverty, ironically, it was not formally included in their vows.  They had to refrain from explicit provisions that would mark their institution as religious convent, which was forbidden by the king. They tucked several prescriptions in their original rules, which prohibited the possession of any personal property.  In fact, no beata of great wealth was ever associated with the Beaterio de la Compania de Jesus.  In the late eighteenth century the institution, together with the Beaterio de San Sebastian, started accepting recogidas, middle-aged women who retired to a Casa de Recogimiento. Despite having reached the age of retirement, which at that time was fifty years, the recogidas of the Compania were to spearhead its missionary expansion in the nineteenth century.

In 1726, Mother Ignacia presented to the archdiocese of Manila, sede vacante, "these rules for the consolation and encouragement of the beatas, that they might continue to serve and please God under the protection of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary and under the guidance of the Reverend Fathers of the Society of Jesus."  The constitution was approved in 1732.

PIONEERS IN THE RETREAT MOVEMENT FOR WOMEN IN THE WORLD
Archbishop Pedro de la Santisima Trinidad Martinez de Arizala, OFM, paid homage to the brown beatas of his archdiocese in 1748 they live in community with great edification to the whole city and contributing to the common good.  They are clothed in black cotton tunic and mantle.  They attend daily Mass at the Jesuit church where they also frequent the Sacraments...They do not observe cloister, as they support themselves partly through the work of their hands and partly by charity of pious people.

They admit to their house the daughters of neighboring Spanish families as well as native children, instructing these young girls in the work proper to their gender.  They number ordinarily between 40 to 50.  Some 250 women, Spanish, Indias, and mestizas, make the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius during the months of September, October and November.  The retreatants gather at the Church of St. Ignatius to hear points for meditation from one of the priests.  Then everyone returns to the beaterio for reflection.  Here Mother Ignacia and her Beatas instruct them in their own tongue on how to derive the most benefit from these reflections and to prepare for a full general confession.  Like Martha of Bethany, the Beatas attend to the needs of the retreatants.  Conceived from and born of the spiritual retreat of its foundress, the Beaterio de la Compania de Jesus became the pioneer in the retreat movement for women in the Catholic world-not only in the Philippines.  It was a mass based and large scale movement.  The beatas formed the first retreat center for women and took a leading part in the spiritual exercises facilitating the role of the retreat master.  In comparison, in Latin America, an Argentinian beata, Sor Maria Antonia de San Jose de la Paz (1730-1799) started the retreat movement for both laywomen and men in her country.  In Europe St. Therese Couderc (1805-1885) founded the Religious of the Cenacle in 1826 in France dedicated to conducting retreats for women.  Padre Murillo Velarde, SJ, collaborated the archbishop's observations on the Filipino beaterio :  What has always been a source of wonder to me is that in spite of their large number and of being all Indias (natives) or mestizas, governed by themselves, in more than seventy years they have not given any reason to talk in the colony.  rather, they have given much edification to all their devotion,humility, application to work and to the Spiritual Exercises.  May God give them perseverance and not permit that there be introduce any relaxation or disorder which might destroy in a day the work of so many years.

Mother Ignacia died on her knees after receiving Jesus in Holy Communion at the communion rail of the church of St. Ignatius in Intramuros on 10 September 1748.  She was truly  a valiant woman, for she not only overcame the great difficulties which she met in this foundation form the beginning til the end...she was self-sacrificing, patient, devoted, spiritual, zealous for the good of souls. She was so humble that she proved it in what I believed to be the greatest way in this matter: by insisting on renouncing the government of that house without letting herself to overcome by that desire to command, which like a wood borer destroys everything from lofty cedar to the lowly hyssop.  She was honored at her burial, which was in our church, by ecclesiastics and Spaniards, who bore her coffin.   Thus, after much hardship borne in her lifetime, she rests in the peace of death and hope in the mercy of God that she will receive the reward of rest and glory which is the dawn of joyous consolation in eternity after sad evening of tears in this life.

In 1737, when Mother Ignacia relinquished her leadership of the beaterio she was succeeded by a Spanish mestiza, Mother Dominga del Rosario Dizon (1690-1763) who had entered in 1710. 

THE ROYAL PATRONAGE
In response to the archbishop's petition, His majesty bestowed his official protection of the native Filipino beaterio in the decree of 25 November in 1775 which was received in Manila one or two years later.

The first Filipino beaterio with the new name Congregation of the Religious of the Virgin Mary became the first Filipino institute to obtain pontifical approval of its constitutions in 1948.  Its foundress, Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo, was declared Venerable by Pope Benedict XVI in 2007.

Novena Litany To Venerable Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo

• Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo, listen to us
  You whose presence we feel in our families, schools, retreat houses, and land, hear us.
  You who taught us to pray the rosary everyday to stay with Christ, hear us.
• Mother Ignacia, pray for us.
  Daughter of St. Ignatius of Loyola in the Spiritual Life, pray for us.
  Bride of Christ from early youth unto all eternity, pray for us.
• Mother Ignacia, we love you.
  A child of humble parents, like Jesus of Nazareth, we love you.
• A young girl who made a retreat before making the first big decision of her life, we love you.
  The young woman who prepared herself by living alone with Christ in a house of  prayer  we love you.
  The young woman who supported herself by working with needle and a pair of scissors, we love you.
  The woman of faith who built her community around the Eucharist, we love you.
  The woman of hope who relied on the providence of God for daily salt and rice, we love you.
  The woman of hope who gathered sticks and firewood to cook her community's meals, we love you.
  The woman of hope who led her community through poverty and daunting obstacles, we love you.
  The woman of love fully aware that love is shown in deeds, we love you.
  The woman of love whose goal is to love God by praising, reverencing, and serving him every moment of her life, we love you.
  The woman of love whose loveliness is the loveliness of Christ nailed to the cross, we love you.
  The founding Superior who insisted on abdicating the power to command and wanting only to be anonymous and be the servant of all, we love you.
  The founding Superior at whose death and funeral the whole city turned out in grief to show its respect and love for her, and gratitude for opening its eyes to the values of the Kingdom of God, we love you.
  Beloved Mother Ignacia, whose community never ceased drawing its strength and fire from the Paschal Mystery of Christ, we love you.
  Beloved Mother Ignacia, whose community started to attract and receive women of all nationalities and continues to attract and receive them in our day, we love you.
  Beloved Mother Ignacia, whose community built and continues to build other communities to shelter the poor of the land and proclaim the Kingdom of God until the Lord returns, we love you.

Let us pray

O God Our Father, look upon our love for Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo, a love which you yourself have instilled in our hearts and continue to nurture in the power of your Holy Spirit.  Look also upon our faith and hope as we present to you our petition for a miracle for her beatification: (Petition)
We ask this in the name of your Son, Our Brother and Savior, who has encouraged us, saying:"Whatever you ask the Father in my name, He will give it to you." Amen.
(1 Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory be for the intentions of the Holy Father).