The Global Dynamic of the Jesuit Development Offices

For more than 14 years the Society of Jesus at the global level has been encouraging the creation and strengthening of province development offices and strategies to increase primarily their philanthropic activity especially at the local level. This is a clear effort to improve the provinces’ ability to sustain themselves for internal needs and for the support of the mission and institutions. 

For ten years support for these efforts was entrusted to Colombian Jorge Serrano and over for the past year the responsibility for the creation and growth is being shifted to the Conferences, with the support of the General Treasurer of the Curia in Rome, Thomas McClain.

As a result of this work, the Society now has a growing number of development offices at the provincial level, who are evermore sharing resources and best practices through meetings on the conference level. The General Treasurer has been meeting monthly for almost a year now with the six conference-level development office network coordinators. The Xavier Network also participates in these meetings which seek to deepen this important dimension of our mission present in the Society since its beginnings: the care of local philanthropy and the ministry to our collaborators in the service of the Church and the world. Further, the Assistant Treasurers in the Curia are participating in the Conference meetings of Province Development Officers.

The reality of cooperation among development offices is very diverse according to conferences, with well-established regional networks such as the case of the Claver Network in the CPAL, or with others of recent configuration that are in the early stages of coordination as in the case of the JCEP’s early efforts at building a sense of common support and the development of philanthropic skills and culture. These monthly meetings are having an enormous richness and impact by facilitating the exchange of in-depth information as well as informing the global strategic reflection with the realities of the universal Society.

One of the keys is to look at ways of fostering a culture of fundraising and the relationship with benefactors in the Jesuits themselves and also the provincial structures, as well as the need for procedures and channels for transparency and good governance. On the other hand, the development offices are not the only actor in Jesuit fundraising in the provinces and therefore the dialogue with institutions that also do corporate fundraising, such as mission offices or Jesuit NGOs, is of vital importance.