Floyd, John

Abstract

John Floyd is an English Jesuit priest, militant defender of the faith, and Counter-Reformation author, also known under the pseudonyms Daniel ả Jesu, I. R., A.C., Fidelis Annosus, and Hermannus Loemelius. Although nothing is known of his parentage, Floyd was the brother of Henry Floyd, also a Jesuit priest. Like other Jesuits with a mandate to teach and preach, Floyd traveled across the continent, wrote prolifically on a range of subjects addressed to a wide audience of clerics and lay readers, and published many works, challenging Protestant thinking and defending a Counter-Reformation papacy. Heavily influenced by scholasticism and the practices of medieval piety, Floyd’s writings emphasize church teachings alongside scripture, but also maintain the active, visible, bodily presence of God.