John Baptist Jordan, (religious name "Father Francis Mary of the Cross") was born 1848 in Gurtweil closed to the boarder line to Switzerland in the south of Germany.
He became an apprentice painter, gilder and decorator.
Following his desire to become a priest he returned to school at the age of 21, completed his secondary studies and concentrated himself on his extraordinary talent for languages.
In a difficult time of political persecution of the church (→ Kulturkampf) in Germany he was ordained 1878 and was sent by his bishop to Rome, where he devoted himself to the study of oiental languages.
During a journey into the Near East a text from the bible inspired him: "This is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ "
( Jn 17:3) - and became the Salvatorian program.
Jordan didn't want to found a religious institute. He wanted to unite the catholic forces in different groups.
Jordan's vision was that women and men should work together for the benefit in the church and so he founded 1881 the Apostolic Teaching Society. He was with an age of 33 one of the youngest founders of a society in the church.
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the new formed Sister's Congregation. In 1885 the Roman Sisters became independent with the new name “Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother”, while Therese continued her vocation and membership. In 1888 Jordan could call Therese von Wüllenweber to Tivoli near Rome to establish the female branch again. The groups of lay associates, already started in 1880, vanished because of lack of personnel and church structures.
Nevertheless, Father Jordan gave all Salvatorians its original alignment along the way and it was taken up by the Second Vatican Council (1962 - 1965): to encourage the laity, to shape the church with responsibility.
Therese v. Wüllenweber
Mother Mary of the Apostels
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