On The Novelty of Tuition for Jesuit Colleges

Since the Second Vatican Council, the order of the Society of Jesus has often sought to return to the charism and the way of life of its first members. There is one ancient regulation that has been ignored, described in a Catholic history of St. Louis, Missouri:

When the Jesuit college opened on the edge of town in l829, Father Peter Verhaegen headed it. On December 28, l832, Missouri governor Daniel Dunkin signed the bill that made Saint Louis University the first university west of the Mississippi. According to Jesuit rule, priests could not charge tuition for their work. However, on January l3, l833, Pope Gregory XVI, at the request of Rosati, signed a dispensation that allowed the university to charge tuition–one of the most significant changes in the Jesuit way of conducting schools since the founding of the Society of Jesus.

Perhaps the sons of Ignatius of Loyola could correct this oversight, turing away from elite money and elite opinion and turning towards economic poverty for the sake of free education.