The founder of one of the most essential Catholic publishing houses in the United States nearly didn’t become a priest.
When Joseph Fessio, S.J. ’62 was a junior at SCU, his girlfriend broke up with him to become a nun. The journey of discernment that followed led him to a life dedicated to the words and works of the faith, a process detailed in a new book by Cornelius Buckley, S.J. ’50.
In Father Joseph Fessio, S.J.: California Blackrobe, Buckley tells the story of one of California’s most famous Jesuits: Fessio, a fellow SCU grad and priest dedicated to Jesuit education.
At just 20 years old, Fessio joined the Society of Jesus and returned to serve as a lecturer at Santa Clara, where he met Buckley. The pair bonded over saying Mass and campus life. At SCU, Fessio created a program to bring underserved high school students onto campus and match them with Jesuit and student mentors, exposing young people to college—and the world—in a new way. The echoes of this endeavor continue on the Mission campus through programs for high school and first-generation college students.
Fessio went on to Europe, studying with some theological giants like Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Joseph Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI). When he returned to the Bay Area it was to serve at the University of San Francisco, where he helped launch the St. Ignatius Institute, a great Catholic books program. In 1978, he cofounded Ignatius Press, one of the largest Catholic publishers in the world.