Francisco de Jasso y Azpilicueta

St. Francis Xavier

The Apostle of the Indies

Overview

Francisco de Jasso (1506–1552) — Basque nobleman, Paris scholar, roommate won over by Ignatius of Loyola — became the Jesuits' first great missionary. Landing at Goa in May 1542 after a 13-month voyage, he spent a decade in ceaseless motion: the hospitals and street-children of Goa, the Pearl Fishery Coast (where tradition says he baptised tens of thousands), Travancore, Ceylon, Malacca, and Japan (1549–51) — before dying at 46 on Shangchuan Island, gazing toward closed China.

Key Facts

• Born: 7 April 1506, Xavier Castle, Navarre (Spain)
• Jesuit: co-founder, Montmartre vows 1534
• India: Goa 1542; Coromandel missions; letters home that recruited generations
• Died: 3 December 1552, Shangchuan — feast day December 3
• Canonised: 1622 (with Ignatius); Patron of Catholic Missions

The Relics

Buried in lime on a Chinese beach, dug up months later incorrupt (so the witnesses swore), Xavier's body travelled Malacca–Goa, arriving March 1554 to crowds of thousands. It rests in the silver casket (Goan silversmiths, 1636–37) in the Basilica of Bom Jesus — right forearm detached to Rome (1614), the rest exposed to pilgrims every ten years at the solemn Exposition (most recently 2014–15). Goans call him simply Goencho Saib — Lord of Goa.

In India

• Goa: the mission's headquarters; his tomb-church is the state's spiritual centre
• The Fishery Coast: Tamil Nadu's Paravar Catholics trace their baptism to his bell-and-catechism tours
• Education: his insistence on native clergy and adapted customs shaped Jesuit method for centuries
• Feast (Dec 3): novenas across Goa, Old Goa's fair, and the decennial Exposition — among the largest Catholic gatherings on earth