The custom that prevails in the Church, in our days, is for a newly-ordained priest to celebrate Mass on the morning following his ordination; but Ignatius and his companions prepared themselves for this great act in an heroic fashion. They buried themselves in caverns or in the ruins of dilapidated monasteries for an entire month, giving themselves up to fasting and prayer, preaching at times in some adjoining town or hamlet. It was on this occasion that the vacillating character of Rodriguez revealed itself. He and Le Jay had taken up their abode in a hermitage near Bassano where a venerable old man named Antonio was reviving in the heart of Italy the practices of the old solitaries of the Thebaid. Rodriguez fell ill and was at the point of death when Ignatius arrived and told him that he would recover. So, indeed, it happened, but singularly enough he was anxious to continue his eremitical life and, without speaking of his doubts to Ignatius, set out to consult the old hermit about it, but became conscience-stricken before he arrived. "O man of little faith, why did you doubt?" was all St. Ignatius said, when Rodriguez confessed what he had done. Nevertheless, that did not cure him, for the desire of leading a life of bodily austerity had taken possession of him and was at the bottom of the trouble which he subsequently caused in Portugal, and also when, in 1554, he wrote entreatingly to Pope Julius III for permission to leave the Society and become a hermit (Prat, Le P. Claude Le Jay, 32, note). At the end of the retreat, they all returned to Venice, where they waited in vain for a ship to carry them to the land of the Mussulmans. It was only when there was absolutely no hope left, that they made up their minds to go back to Rome, and put themselves at the disposal of the Pope for any work he might give them. As this was fully twenty years after Martin Luther had nailed his thesis to the church door of Wittenberg, it is clear that Ignatius had no idea of attacking Protestantism when he founded the Society of Jesus.