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TO THE NATIONS AND NATION:

The Apostle of the Indies and the Apostle of Ceylon

Ad genies —

to the nations - is the

at an effort is made in this brief write-up

tisfied ) interested in hearing more abcut

myths . The deliberate use of plural and

Ad genies, IV, § 23).

Hence, any

(Ad genies, 1, § 5),

and the only

poverty and obedience and self-sacrifice to death"

I bid). If

the same decree on missions reco-

BY;.

TEOTONIO R. DE SOUZA

Director, Xavier Centre of Historical Research, Goa.

"should learn the history, aim, and method of the

Church's missionary activity, and the special social,

economic and cultural conditions of- their, own

people "

(Ibid., II, § 16)

it is only to make them

better aware of the

inc rn tion l

method in the

changing historical "circumstanccs in which the

mission is exercised " (

Ibid ., I, § 6).

Two Co founders

In the persons

of

Francis Xavier and Joseph

Vaz we have two co-founders of two religious

bodies, namely the Society of Jesus and the Ora-

torians of Goa. They originated from distant

lands : One a Spanish basque and a stranger to

the culture of India and the East; the other a Goan

brahmin of Salcete and better equipped to meet

the cultural demands of the people to whom he

preached the gospel. Both had Goa, the head-

quarters of the Portuguese empire, as their base

of missionary activities. However, the time-interval

between them was about a century and half, and

the fortunes of the Portuguese empire differed as

much : When Francis Xavier arrived in India

(1542)

the Portuguese power was almost at its

zenith and the Portuguese gunboat was in a posi-

tion to terrorize the natives into c.mversion if the

threats of hell or material allurements failed

Joseph Vaz had to operate in times (1681-1711)

when the Portuguese writ was no more respected

in Kanara or in Ceylon. The Dutch commercial

and religious rivals had wrestld away the most

prized spice-lands : clove-lands of Moluccas, the

cinnamon-land of Ceylon, and he pepper-lands of

Malabar.

If Francis Xavier laid the foundation of the

Church on a massive scale and reached

n tions

till the Far East, Fr. Joseph Vaz has rightly been

credited with the second foundation of the Church

of

Ceylon in a way that was no longer "foreign

to the people or to the rulers of that land. What-

ever the differences of their personal backgrounds,



Xavier in Paris had ended when he witnessed the

deadly effects of venereal disease on a senior com-

panion of his games. It had been such a traumatic

experience that contact with a woman even in a

dreamr led him to inflict on himself bloody injuries

The saint himself admitted later that God had

granted him at that moment a special grace of

preserving his virginity (Schurhammer, op.

cit.,

1, 727) There have been no lack of hints that Fran-

cis Xavier was a women-hater. But without going

to such an extreme conclusion, we could definitely

say that he did not put much trust in a woman.

Among the many practical instructions that he left

for the provincial-designate before leaving for

China, we read "Never blame the husband in

public, even though he may be at fault, since

women are so indomitable

... (Schurhammer,

op. cit.,

IV,

544).

In the many small and detailed instructions

that Francis Xavier conveyed in his written notes

to Francisco Mansilhas, his Jesuit aide in the

Fishery Coast, or to Fr. Gaspar Barze as mentioned

above, we find a sort of resumé of what one may

call the " methodology of St. Francis Xavier ".

Much that he was advising others, he was striving

to practise in his own life

atience, cheerfulness,

ever-readiness to serve the sick and the poor and

the prisoners, preaching repentance, and above all

to be constantly on the move No surprise if he

was always in a hurry and was a burn-out in ten

years

Joseph Vaz was no less in a hurry We are

told by Fr. Pedro de Saldanha, a close companion

of Fr. Joseph Vaz in Ceylon " I have never seen

him incline to take any rest except when he is

indisposed and ordered to do so by obedience

He is very seldom in this church, but he is

constantly going on mission tours. When his

tours are over, he returns to this city of Candia

and begins to visit the surrounding districts. This

is a very toilsome work, as the city is situated in

the centre of many hills and forests and mountain

ranges ...

" He adds "From the various servants

wft6 accompanied him in his long journeys 1 heard

that they have never been able to keep pace with

Father Vaz, for he walks much and with great

speed a testimony i can endorse from my own

experience of the journey I made with him from

Potulao to Mantota " ( V. Pernioja,

The Catholic

Church in

Sri

Lanka,

1984, Vol. I: pp. 2723)

Apparently, all his energy came from rice boiled

in water and his unlimited trust in Providence

If he lived longer than Francis Xavier in spite of

leading an equally strenous life we could humanly

attribute it to his native constitution that could

better withstand our Indian strains. From the first

attack of dysentery on his arrival in Ceylon in

1987, through the gruesome trial of his physical

resistance during the year-long epidemic ten years

later, till his death that followed a long and painful

abscess in a ear, he kept up his practice of visiting

every single family of Ceylon at least once a year

Fortunately for him by 1705 his burden was shared

by nine priests of his Oratory.

It is true that Francis Xavier died uttering

" In Thee, 0 Lord, have I hoped; let me never be

confounded ". Joseph Vaz did not have to utter

any such words. He was a living example of trust

in God's Providence. He always preferred the

opinion of others to his own, and regarded it as

the surest way of finding and doing God's will.

More than once he had to countenance opposition,

changes and delays in the execution of his life.

dream of assisting the Christianity of Ceylon.

His experience was not different fiom

that

f the

arlier Apostle :

"

For those

who love God everything leads to good ". His

formation in Goa, the years of apprenticeship in

Kanara, the formation of the Oratory, were stages

through which he was unwittingly led by Provi-

dence towards the ultimate mission that was

reserved for him.

Joseph Vaz did notfail to reach his

nation.

It was a small nation compared to the Indies of

Francis Xavier, but it was a hard nut to crack.

Only a man in disguise, without fanfare of presti-

gious appointments, without foreign political

patr nage, unhampared by jurisdictional rivalries

of

Padroado

and Propaganda

and backed by a

group that was small enough not to attract

unwanted publicity could be an apostle of Ceylon.

Joseph Vaz fulfilled all these requirements. While

Francis Xavier made a good apostle for the Indies,

only Joseph Vaz could be the right apostle for

Ceylon. Unworthy as I feel of presenting any

bird's-eye-view of two missionary giants, this

exercise of assessing them may at best be

regarded as a worm's-eye-view of someone who

holds them in deep esteem.

XCHR, Alto de Porvorim.

- 67 -

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