THE PEDRO ARRUPE WORLD ASSOCIATION

 

The Pedro Arrupe World Association was created in 1986 at the World Congress of Jesuit Alumni in Versailles, in response to a specific appeal of Father Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, then Superior General of the Society of Jesus, who wished that the Alumni formed for themselves the instruments that will enable them to act for refugees. The Association is named after Father Pedro Arrupe, former Superior General of the Society of Jesus, as a tribute to his action towards refugees, which he wanted to serve and to accompany by creating the Jesuit Refugees Service in 1980.

Under the umbrella of WUJA, the Association became its means of action (its “social arm”, after the expression of Fabio Tobon, former President of WUJA, passed away in 2013) for its social work around the world towards “refugees, poor, excluded people” and victims of humanitarian catastrophes.

Its resources come from donations made by Alumni individually or through their Associations and Federations within the “Arrupe Dollar Campaign”, launched ever year, on 5th February, anniversary of Fr. Pedro Arrupe’s death.

Every Alumnus is individually invited to pay $ 1 (or € 1 in Europe) to the Pedro Arrupe World Association. Local associations are also invited to contribute $ 1 (or € 1) out of every paid membership that they received and to donate the sum of these amounts to the Pedro Arrupe World Association.

Associations which cannot give such a sum may decide to donate an adapted amount, in order to participate in a symbolic way to this worldwide campaign.

Check the status update on our 2022 Campaign.

Please donate 1€ or more to support this campaign!

The Association mainly provides moral and financial support to social-educational programs initiated by some Alumni or Jesuits working on the ground, or by Jesuit networks active in social or humanitarian fields, as the JRS (Jesuit Refugees Service) of AJAN (African Jesuit Aids Network). It can also respond to humanitarian catastrophes in a country where Jesuit Alumni are involved to help affected populations (recent examples are Indonesia and Haiti). Its decisions are made by an operational committee, based on information about the situation and the needs of the intended beneficiaries transmitted by people who run these programs (Jesuit or Alumni). Those people then give a report about the implementation of funded programs.

The Association is placed under the authority of the Executive Committee of WUJA. Its statutes are deposited in Luxemburg. Decisions about the Arrupe Dollar Campaign are made on a daily basis by a small operational team, which reports every year to the Executive Committee of WUJA about the activities and the financial situation.