Inside the Shrine the ante-refectory and the refectory deserve special attention.

The Ante-Refectory.

The Ante-Refectory and the Refectory are the two most noteworthy rooms of the College building, the ones with the most ambitious design, in which the marble of the windows, the arches and the floor blend to perfection with the white limestone of the walls and the vaults. This creates a sober and at the same time elegant atmosphere.

The groin vaults of the ante-refectory lean on two graceful columns of black marble and shelter an octagonal fountain of speckled marble, a typical element of monastic ante-refectories.

A picture of the Immaculate Conception and eight portraits of Jesuit missionaries dressed in a variety of exotic garbs adorn the walls.

The Refectory.

The Refectory is presided by a picture of the Last Supper that covers the entire front wall. It is signed in Rome in the year 1754 by Philadelphius Largan[us] Sic[ulus].

A picture over the entrance door shows the Blessed Virgin Mary dictating the Exercises to St Ignatius. “Dictante Deipara discit et docet”, says a Latin text. The pigeonholes on either side date back to the 18th century.

Ten portraits of Jesuit Cardinals hang on the walls. They were sent from Rome in 1757 and represent the Cardinals of the pre-suppression Society, from the first, Francisco de Toledo, created by Clement VIII in 1593, to the most recent, Álvaro Cienfuegos, created by Clement XI in 1720.

Several factors contribute to make the refectory impressive: the contrasting colors of the marble and the limestone, perfectly blending with the warm purple of the cardinals and the dark hue of the chestnut wood of the pavement and the furniture.

The Ante-Refectory and the Refectory constitute a kind of summons, almost nostalgic, for a non-monastic Order like the Society of Jesus. It is known that the refectories of Mendicant Orders and Clerks Regular have sometimes played the role of the chapter rooms of the monasteries. Thus, too, these rooms have watched generations of Jesuits, heard appointments of Provincials and Superiors, decrees of divisions of Provinces, witnessed public penances, readings, and the naïve homilies of would-be apostles.

For anyone who may let himself be carried by a sense of history, there hide three centuries and a half of Jesuit history, the failures and triumphs of a Society of Jesus obstinately seeking the Greater Glory of God in a world that equally celebrates momentous agreements and monumental disagreements. The history of the House of Loyola, from which the Jesuits have been thrown out eight times, is a witness.


In an Order with a four centuries and a half history, a 21,000-membership, and hundreds of houses strewn all over the world, Loyola may be the most fascinating of them all.