Today, 3rd December, the feast of our patron, St. Francis Xavier, the dashing Jesuit Spaniard, a nobleman who renounced his castle and high society in Spain to do our Lord's bidding, to toil in our Lord's vineyard and plant the seed of a new faith in our land. The warm embers of Christian faith,
With Goa as his base , he plunged in to depths of Asia to preach the Gospels. A new Kingdom, not of this world and finally to leave for heavenly abode in the far corners of Asia Shangchuan Island, Taishan, China. .
He dwells among us in a Basilica of Bom Jesus at Old Goa, for some five hundred years now, his incorruptible body kept in a silver casket, exposed to elements, defying mother natures physical laws of decay to await the final resurrection, when we'll all come alive yes, bodily again. there is no better proof than the incorruptible relics of the Saints that the last day is for certain.
Like everything else in our contemporary times, our saint is subject to calumny, lies with fake news, false quotes, innuendos. but not once did he suggest in his letters to the Portuguese King or the Pope in the 16th century, the original and authentic translation of St Francis Letters by Henry James Coleridge, to establish an office of Holy Inquisition in Goa and same be visited upon natives.
Instead, his ire and his criticism was leveled on the colonial regime with their indolent and corrupt ways that thwarted his missionary zeal. It will be against the grain of Christ teaching to preach Good News with the use of Inquisition or as a tool for forced conversion or any inducement, Christ command was to move on, ".. whosoever will not receive you, when ye go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet for a testimony against them"
but yes, our Church in its long two thousand years of existence to quell heresy did veer from the Gospels and Christ had forewarned us about wolves in sheep clothing's in our Church.
In the end, Our Church did repent and amended its ways. there is more rejoicing in heaven above for the those who repent, than for the self righteous who do not .
In the gory inquisition annals there is a famous case of Joan Of Arc, the French patriot who rallied her countrymen but was intercepted by the English forces. And later burnt at stake after her long ordeal with the English Inquisition cabal and in her final hours as the flames swept around her she begged forgiveness for her Inquisitors and today our church has rightly declared her as a saint and not a heretic.
happy Feast!