Last year, the Jesuits announced that they will cease to provide retreats and training at the Loyola Hall Spirituality Centre on Merseyside from Easter 2014.

After a long and detailed consultation, the British Provincial has notified the team and staff of the house in Rainhill that, due to limited resources and manpower, the British Province will be providing residential retreats principally through St Beuno’s Spirituality Centre in North Wales.

This reflected changes taking place outside Loyola Hall, and principally because fewer Jesuits were now available to provide a community and to direct more than one large retreat centre.

Loyola Hall was originally built as Rainhill House in 1824 as a coaching-stop between Manchester and Liverpool. It was acquired by the Society of Jesus in 1923.

The Jesuits initially ran 30-day retreats based on the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola and weekend retreats for working mens’ sodalities (lay groups) and parish groups.

After the Second World War, Loyola Hall provided RAF Leadership Courses and between the 1940s and 1960s began introducing individually-guided retreats, which gave retreatants the opportunity to meet their spiritual director individually every day for spiritual direction.

A new wing with residential accommodation was opened in 1967 and further land acquired to increase the peaceful nature of the location for those who wished to walk around the grounds, although this has become increasingly less possible in recent years, with the encroachment of urban development. Expansion at Loyola Hall coincided with a period of exceptional growth in the British Province.

The Society in Britain today continues to attract vocations of around two or three a year, but this is clearly not on the same scale as in the 1950s or 60s when the number of Jesuits was close to 1,000.

In recent years, Loyola Hall has continued to offer weekend, eight-day and 30-day courses in Jesuit spirituality, under the direction of a diverse and experienced team made up of lay people and other religious orders, as well as Jesuits.