section_path: Religion, science, philosophy, and education/Counter-Reformation and Jesuits
section_name: Counter-Reformation and Jesuits
paragraph_text: Counter-Reformation and Jesuits
  
  The Counter-Reformation was a period of Catholic revival in response to the Reformation during the mid-16th to mid-17th centuries. The Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort, involving ecclesiastical reforms as well as political and spiritual movements.
  
  Such reforms included the foundation of seminaries for the proper training of priests, the reform of religious life by returning orders to their spiritual foundations, and new spiritual movements focusing on the devotional life and a personal relationship with Christ, including the Spanish mystics and the French school of spirituality. It also involved political activities that included the Roman Inquisition.
  
  New religious orders were a fundamental part of this trend. Orders such as the Capuchins, Ursulines, Theatines, Discalced Carmelites, the Barnabites, and especially the Jesuits strengthened rural parishes, improved popular piety, helped to curb corruption within the church, and set examples that would be a strong impetus for Catholic renewal.