Skip to content

We ask you, urgently: don’t scroll past this

Dear readers, Catholic Online was de-platformed by Shopify for our pro-life beliefs. They shut down our Catholic Online, Catholic Online School, Prayer Candles, and Catholic Online Learning Resources—essential faith tools serving over 1.4 million students and millions of families worldwide. Our founders, now in their 70's, just gave their entire life savings to protect this mission. But fewer than 2% of readers donate. If everyone gave just $5, the cost of a coffee, we could rebuild stronger and keep Catholic education free for all. Stand with us in faith. Thank you.

Help Now >

Patrick Anderson

Free World Class Education
FREE Catholic Classes

A Scottish Jesuit, b. at Elgin in Morayshire in 1575; died in London, 24 September, 1624. he was the nephew of Dr. John Leslie , Bishop of Ross, a faithful adherent of Mary Queen of Scots, and her ambassador at the French Court. After completing his education at the university of Edinburgh, he entered the Society of Jesus at Rome, in 1597, and in due time acquired a reputation as a linguist, mathematician, philosopher, and divine. In 1609, he was appointed to the Scotch mission, where his labours were highly successful and his hairbreadth escapes from the pursuivants truly marvelous. He left Scotland for Paris to meet his superior, Father James Gordon, late in 1611. Father Anderson undertook to supply the great dearth of missionaries in his native country by collecting nearly one hundred youths in Scotland, all of them most eager to serve God and the Church. In 1615 he became the first Jesuit Rector of the Scots College in Rome, founded fifteen years before by Pope Clement VIII. Returning to Scotland, he was soon after betrayed by a pretended Catholic, and committed to the Tolbooth jail, Edinburgh, where, in the daily expectation of torture and death, he displayed the heroic intrepidity of a true martyr. He was finally set at liberty on the petition, it is supposed, of the French Ambassador who requested to have him for his confessor.

Father Anderson has left us some valuable and interesting letters relating to his missionary labours in Scotland ; these letters may be found in the London "Month" for December, 1876. No one was better qualified to bear witness to the state of the Church in Scotland during the reign of James the First. In 1623 he published "The Ground of the Catholicke and Roman Religion in the Word of God " a work which shows he had carefully studied the scriptural argument for the Catholic Faith. While imprisoned in Edinburgh, he also compiled the "Memoirs of the Scotch Saints", formerly in manuscript at the Scots College in Paris.

Join the Movement
When you sign up below, you don't just join an email list - you're joining an entire movement for Free world class Catholic education.

Catholic Online Logo

Copyright 2024 Catholic Online. All materials contained on this site, whether written, audible or visual are the exclusive property of Catholic Online and are protected under U.S. and International copyright laws, © Copyright 2024 Catholic Online. Any unauthorized use, without prior written consent of Catholic Online is strictly forbidden and prohibited.

Catholic Online is a Project of Your Catholic Voice Foundation, a Not-for-Profit Corporation. Your Catholic Voice Foundation has been granted a recognition of tax exemption under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Federal Tax Identification Number: 81-0596847. Your gift is tax-deductible as allowed by law.