The Ignatian motto ‒ Honor of God, Salvation of Souls, Our Utmost for His Highest – recalls Ignatians to the essentials of Christian life, already contained in Christ’s Great Commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with the love of thy whole heart, and thy whole soul, and thy whole strength, and thy whole mind; and thy neighbour as thyself” (Lk 10:27).
The resolve to combat for the honor of God and the salvation of souls requires living without compromise with evil, whether in the form of blatant immorality or subtle ambiguity.
For the great evil of the present time consists in “seeking to please God without offending the devil, or, to put it in a better way, to serve the devil without offending God” (Henri Le Floch, Le Cardinal Billot)
The individual pages for each of the three parts of the motto explain their significance in detail.
Other mottos dear to the Society of Ignatians are:
Urgent Veritas et Caritas Christi!
The Truth of Christ Urges Us!
The Truth of Christ Urges Us to Action!
” ‘Born for Combat’ with ‘the Sword of the Spirit’ ” (Pope Leo XIII and Ephesians 6: 17)