John Ogilvie

• Name  : Ogilvie
• Born  : 1579
• Died  : 1615
• Category  : Religious Figures
• Finest Moment : Ordination as a Jesuit priest

'Hanged in Edinburgh as a Jesuit, he was canonised 361 years later'

John Ogilvie was born near Keith in Banffshire. Educated by the Society of Jesuits in Germany, he joined their Order in 1608 and was ordained in Paris. The Jesuits were founded in 1534 by one Ignatius Loyola, with the aims of protecting Catholicism against the Reformation, as well as carrying out missionary work. It received papal approval in 1540.

He returned to Scotland disguised as a soldier (the Jesuits were in any case infused with a spirit of military discipline, with long and arduous training). He was arrested in Glasgow, in 1614, tried, and hanged in Edinburgh.

As a martyr of the counter-Reformation, he was beatified in 1929 and canonised in 1976.

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