'Did you mean that I ought to say: ”I’m a priest?”. The industrial apostolate of the Dutch Jesuits in the city of Rotterdam and its suburbs, 1947-1988' (part II).

The industrial mission work of the Dutch Jesuits flourished in the fifties. The laity
as «apostles» on the shop floor were crucial in this process. Due to practical experience acquired by the industrial chaplains, the focus of the “social work” shifted in the mid-fifties from the individual worker to the factory as a community. The Jesuits became aware of the unequal conditions employees faced in the capitalist system. They regarded the unfair treatment of workers by the capitalist economic system as incompatible with Christian ethics. General Arrupe, elected 1965, held the same opinion and encouraged their work. However, the lack of a theological foundation became problematic. A Dutch Jesuit research centre for social work could have given it a more theoretical basis. In 1969, faced with serious leaves, the Dutch Jesuits concluded that their industrial apostolate could not survive as an independent pastoral project. They began to integrate it into diocesan structures.