St. Francis Xavier, born Francisco de Jasso y Azpilicueta, was a Spanish Roman Catholic missionary.
Background
Francis Xavier was born on April 7, 1506, in Javier, Kingdom of Navarre (present day Spain), to a noble family, and his childhood was one of privilege - however, it was disrupted by his father's death, as well as by outside efforts to take control of Navarre.
Education
In 1525, Francis journeyed to the University of Paris, the theological centre of Europe, to begin his studies. During his studies, he shared his room with Pierre Favre and Ignatius of Loyola. Ignatius converted several students to priesthood and after several attempts Francis was the last to acquiesce.
Career
In 1530 after receiving the degree of Master of Arts, he started teaching Aristotelian philosophy at the Beauvais College, University of Paris.
Four years later Francis, Ignatius, Alfonso Salmeron, Diego Lainez, Nicolas Bobadilla, Peter Faber and Siamo Rodrigues met in a crypt beneath the church of Saint Denis, Paris, and made the private vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to the Pope. Francis Xavier was ordained in 1537.
The King of Portugal requested the Pope Paul III to bestow upon him priests to spread the faith in his new Indian possessions. Hesitantly the Pope sent Francis Xavier and he became the first Jesuit missionary.
He left Rome on March 15, 1540 and reached Lisbon in June 1540. There the missionaries had a private audience with the King and the Queen. The Pope declared Francis the apostolic nuncio for the East and he left Lisbon and arrived in India in 1542.
Francis Xavier witnessed that there were few preachers and no priests beyond Goa. He began by teaching children and aiding the sick in hospitals. He headed the Saint Paul's College, the first Jesuit headquarter in Asia.
Francis sailed to Cape Comorin in October 1542 as he learned that the Paravas residents had been baptised 10 years ago but knew nothing about the religion. He learned the native language and began preaching; however, he found no success in preaching to the high-caste Brahmins.
He remained in the Indian coastal regions for the next three years. He also went to Sri Lanka to convert people. During this period he built a total of 40 churches.
In 1549, he reached Japan and in September he met the hospitable Shimazu Takahisa, the daimyo of Satsuma. Everything went well until Xavier began talking about conversion. On this, the daimyo forbade the conversion of his subjects to Christianity.
He found converting Japanese people extremely hard as the language was too difficult to learn and the natives could not grasp the concept of hell.
He found some success with the Shingon monks as he referred to his Christian god as Dainichi. But when the monks realised that their guest was a preacher of a rival religion, they detested him and became aggressive.
He stayed in Japan for two more years and saw congregations being formed in Hirado, Yamaguchi and Bungo. Being the first missionary he laid the founding stone for his successors.
In 1552 he left aboard the Santa Cruz for China. After a few months he reached the Chinese island of Shangchuan and a man agreed to take him to mainland China for a large sum of money. Francis Xavier passed away on December 3, 1552 after suffering from a fever. He was in Shangchuan and was waiting to be taken to mainland China. His body was first buried in Taishan, Guangdong. Then it was transported to St. Paul's Church in Malacca and in 1553 it was shipped to Goa and is now in the Basilica of Born Jesus.
Views
Quotations:
"Many, many people hereabouts are not becoming Christians for one reason only: there is nobody to make them Christians. "
"I have heard thousands of confessions, but never one of covetousness. "
"Tell the students to give up their small ambitions and come eastward to preach the gospel of Christ. "
"I want to be where there are out and out pagans. "