BROU, ALEXANDRE. — French Jesuit, writer, and missiologist, born on 26 April 1862 at Chartres, died at Laval on 12 March 1947. After his studies, conducted largely in England because of the expulsion of the Jesuits from France, he was assigned to the literary and spiritual formation of his younger confrères at Canterbury (1894–97, 1907–10, and 1920–23), Jersey (1902–1906 and 1911–19), and Laval (1899–1901 and 1924). At the same time, he carried on a fruitful activity as a writer and, from 1909, contributed to the Paris Jesuit journal Les Études, joining its editorial staff in 1927 and settling in Paris.
Among his multifaceted works, several volumes were the fruit of his teaching, for example Le Dix-huitième Siècle littéraire (3 vols., Paris 1923–27). But his greatest activity concerned questions of missiology and missionary history. His biography St François Xavier (2 vols., Paris 1912; 2nd ed., ibid. 1923) remains highly esteemed; it was followed by: Vie populaire de st Fr. Xavier (2nd ed., Toulouse 1914); St Fr. Xavier. Conditions et méthodes de son apostolat (Bruges 1925); S. Fr. Xavier. Lettres spirituelles (Paris 1937). In addition: Les Jésuites missionnaires au XIXe siècle (Brussels 1905), later taken up again in Jésuites missionnaires: Un siècle (Paris 1924, in collaboration with Fr. G. Gibert) and in Cent ans de missions. Les Jésuites missionnaires au XIXe siècle (ibid. 1935). In a very different genre: Xaverins. Essai de directoire ascétique à l'usage des missionnaires de la Compagnie de Jésus (Toulouse 1930). In Études, Fr. B.’s particular field was always the missions, especially those of India and China.
He also wrote about his Order: Les Jésuites de la légende. Des origines à Pascal. De Pascal à nos jours (2 vols., Paris 1906–1907), which grew out of his literary studies; Les Jésuites morts pour la France (ibid. 1921); La Compagnie de Jésus (ibid. 1924); and several biographies: Un Jésuite breton. Le p. Edouard Marquet (ibid. 1913); Un soldat de la Croix, Le p. Marc Barthélemy, missionnaire dans l'Afrique du Sud (ibid. 1917); Le p. Paul Aucler, aumônier militaire (ibid. 1937, in collaboration with Fr. F. Gibert).
The following three works, at once historical and ascetical, are particularly mature: La spiritualité de s. Ignace (Paris 1914); Les Exercices Spirituels de s. Ignace. Histoire et psychologie (ibid. 1922); S. Ignace maître d'oraison (ibid. 1925).
Finally, outside the main series, we may mention the two hagiographical booklets: S. Augustin de Cantorbéry, Paris 1897; Travail et prière. S. Marie-Madeleine-Sophie Barat (ibid. 1923); and a small volume of meditations, Au puit de Jacob (Tournai 1922).