Wadding
LUKE, an Irish ecclesiastic; born in Waterford, Ireland, Oct. 16, 1588; after studying theology at the Lisbon Jesuit Seminary, entered the Franciscan order (1607), and became Professor of Divinity in the University of Salamanca. As chaplain to an embassy despatched to treat concerning the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, he went to Rome in 1618, and settling there, founded the Irish Franciscan College of St. Isidore (1625), acted as papal councilor in the great controversy with the Jansenists, whose tenets he shared at first, but presently renounced; and was procurator of his order (1630-1634) and vice-commissary (1645-1648). He refused a cardinal's hat, and died in Rome, Nov. 18, 1657, having himself composed the "Annals of Minor Ordinances" (8 vols. 1625-1656; new ed. 22 vols. 1731- 1747), and "Scriptures of Minor Ordinances" (1660; new ed. 1806), and edited Calasio's posthumous "Biblical Concordance" (4 vols. 1621) and the works of Duns Scotus (12 vols. 1620).