1500's

• 1534 The first Barnabite Community: 9 members; average age, 30. The youngest was 20, the oldest, 37, the Founder himself, 32. Seven died young, between the age of 35 and 49, the Founder dying at 37. All outstanding Religious.
• 1545 Acquisition of St. Barnabas Church and House, our historical motherhouse.
• 1551 Temporary Constitutions.
• 1575 First parish, Rome, Italy.
• 1579 Permanent Constitutions under the guidance of St. Charles Borromeo.
• St. Alexander Sauli (1534-1592) makes his mark: Superior General and Bishop, he is considered the ideal Barnabite, a man of deep learning, piety, and enthusiastic pastoral ministry.

1600's

• Expansion outside Italy: Savoy (1614), France (1620), Austria (1626), Czechoslovakia (1627).
• 1608 First school, Milan, Italy.
• 1613 First school outside Italy, Savoy.
• 1622 General Curia transferred from the historical motherhouse in Milan to Rome.
• 1630-1631 Thirty one Barnabites give their life ministering to the plague-stricken in Northern Italy.
• 1666 "Barnabite Rules of Study."
• 1680 First Boarding School, France.
• 1699 First Barnabite Cardinal, Giacomo Antonio Morigia, Archbishop of Florence, 1683-1708.
• Learning flourishes in history, rubrics, architecture, astronomy, spirituality, theology, canon law, exegesis, epigraphy, literature.
  • Fr. Redento Baranzano (1590-1622) precursor of Galileo Galilei and author of Uranoscopia (1617) where he favored the Copernican system over the Ptolemaic system.
  • Fr. Ottavio Boldoni (1600-1680) is appointed by Pope Clement IX First Curator of the Vatican Library.

1700's

• 1701 First Province outside Italy, France.
• 1722-1830 Burma Mission.
  • The Barnabites published the first Burmese dictionary and grammar, studies of Burmese history, geography, and ethnography, a pioneering study of 300 flowers and 200 animals, a description of precious stones, and a study of Burmese pharmacology. Even more fundamental was the compilation of the first Burman alphabet (1776) which produced 60,000 Burmese typographic characters.
• 1732 Beginning of Barnabite devotion to Our Lady, Mother of Divine Providence.
• 1749 Barnabite schools in Italy are granted the right to confer doctorates in theology and to be titled universities.
• Eminent Barnabites:
  • Cardinal Sigismondo Gerdil (1718-1802), the major Christian philosopher of the century and encyclopedic scholar, author of 20 large volumes on education, logic, metaphysics, mathematics, physics, law and theology. His Description of the Characteristics of True Religion had 70 editions in 5 languages.
  • St. Francis Xavier Bianchi (1743-1815), another ideal Barnabite, scholar and Apostle of Naples.

1800's

• 1814-1825 Following the Napoleonic suppression of Religious Orders, the Barnabites reorganize under the leadership of two Barnabite Cardinals, Luigi Lambruschini and Francesco Fontana.
• The Barnabite tradition of spirituality, learning and pastoral ministry resumes:
  • Fr. Fortunato Redolfi founds the first Catholic Youth Center in Italy (early 1820's)
  • Fr. Luigi Ungarelli establishes the Vatican Egyptian museum
  • Fr. Luigi Bruzza is the leading epigraphist in Italy
  • Fr. Francesco Denza restores and becomes first Director of the Vatican Observatory.
  • Fr. Carlo Vercellone publishes the facsimile edition of the famous Codex Vaticanus, a 4th c. A.D. manuscript of the Bible
• Five Barnabite Cardinals:
  • Fontana accompanies Pius VII, exiled by Napoleon to France
  • Cadolini, a great pastor and orator
  • Lambruschini, Secretary of State to Gregory XVI
  • Bilio, the leading theologian among cardinals and a leader at Vatican Council I
  • Granniello, a fervent ecumenist.
• Other ecumenists: a Russian convert (Fr. Agostino Schouvaloff); two Norwegian converts (Fr. Paolo Stub and Fr. Charles Schilling), and the celebrated Fr. Cesare Tondini (1839-1907), a polyglot who traveled all over Europe promoting the union of Eastern Orthodox Churches with the Catholic Church.

1900's

• Worldwide expansion.
• Continuing tradition of spirituality, learning and pastoral ministry. A selected list:
  • Venerable Charles Schilling (1835-1907), a Lutheran convert, spiritual director.
  • Servant of God Giovanni Semeria (1867-1931), orthodox Modernist, eminent scholar, "Father of Orphans," precursor of Vatican II.
  • Servant of God Cesare Barzaghi (1863-1941), scholar and "Apostle of Lodi," a Northern Italian city.
  • Orazio Premoli (1864-1928), the primary modern historian of the Order.
  • Giuseppe Boffito (1869-1940), eminent scholar, major bibliographer and bibliophile, author of 4 massive volumes on all Barnabite writers and their works.
  • Vincenzo Cilento (1903-1980), first-rate classicist, philologist, the only Italian translator of Plotinus.
  • Umberto Fasola (1917-1989), catacombs scholar and director of all catacombs of Italy.
  • Giuseppe Cagni (1929-), major historian of the Order.
  • Luigi Cagni (1929-1998), Assyriologist.
  • Antonio Gentili (1937-), spiritual director and author of bestsellers in spirituality.
  • Sergio Pagano (1949-), vice-president of the Secret Vatican Archives; Professor of Diplomatics in the Vatican School of Paleography, Diplomatics and Archival Studies; major editor of The Documents of the Trial of Galileo Galilei (1986) and of New Documents on Vittoria Colonna and Reginald Pole (1989)
• 1983 New Constitutions, updated according to the directives of Vatican Council II.