ÁLVAREZ DE PAZ, DIEGO. — One of the principal spiritual authors of the Society of Jesus. Born in Toledo in 1560, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1578 and was attending the theology lectures of Fr Gabriele Vázquez at Alcalá when he departed in 1584 for Peru, where he completed his studies and was ordained to the priesthood (1586). Professor of philosophy, then of theology and Sacred Scripture, he subsequently became rector of the colleges of Quito (1596–1600) and Cuzco (1601–1605), vice-provincial of Tucumán (1605–1607), prefect of studies, and then rector in Lima (1609). At the end of 1616 or the beginning of 1617 he was appointed provincial of Peru, an office he held until his death at Potosí on 17 January 1620. A zealous superior, he promoted the eradication of idolatrous superstitions among the converted Indians. He repeatedly and unsuccessfully asked the colonial authorities to place Lima in a state of defence against the English pirates.
A. owes his fame to the three folio volumes published in Lyon by the printer Horace Cardon: De vita spirituali eiusque perfectione, 1618; De exterminatione mali et promotione boni, 1613; De inquisitione pacis seu studio orationis, 1617 (for the partial reprints, cf. Sommervogel and Uriarte-Lecina; for practical use, the reprint in Vivès, Opera omnia, Paris 1875–76, 6 vols. in 4º, is useful). They constitute the organic parts of a great synthetic exposition of spiritual theology (contemporary with the Epercio de perfección of A. Rodríguez, the De virtute et statu religionis of F. Suárez, and the De la perfección del cristiano en todos sus estados of
P. De la Puente). The first volume treats of the nature and degrees of the spiritual life and of evangelical perfection; the second of the practice of perfection, on the one hand through the destruction of sins and vices and the mortification of the passions (one of the finest sections), and on the other through the acquisition of the virtues, especially humility, and through the three religious vows. The third volume is devoted entirely to prayer: vocal prayer (the Divine Office) and mental prayer; what precedes, accompanies, and follows prayer; the subject matter of prayer for beginners, those making progress, and the perfect (here A. inserts a series of 249 meditations; his almost continuous use of the form of meditation consisting of colloquies is noteworthy); then, in the final two treatises, affective prayer and perfect contemplation. According to the plan set out by the author in the preface to the first volume, this third volume was also to treat «de procuranda animarum salute»; but the space devoted to the subject of prayer did not allow this, and A. promised to make it the subject of a separate book, which he subsequently had no time to write.
Written entirely in Latin (unlike the works of the great Spanish spiritual authors of the period), A.’s work is markedly didactic in character (with extensive, and at times somewhat excessive, use of divisions) and, above all, theological; it combines great doctrinal precision with a wealth of biblical and patristic material. A. is the first theorist of affective prayer, clearly distinguishing between meditation and contemplation (vol. III, chap. IV). He is the first Jesuit to have dealt extensively with infused contemplation; in addition to his manifest personal experience, his sources here are exclusively medieval: St Tommaso, the Victorines, etc.; his residence in Peru did not allow him to know, or at least to make use of, the writings of St Teresa and the other contemporary mystics.