Saint Gonsalo Garcia

Saint Gonsalo Garcia

Saint Gonsalo Garcia, O.F.M., (1556 – 5 February 1597) was a Roman Catholic Franciscan friar from Portuguese India, who died as a martyr in Japan and is venerated as a saint, one of the Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan so venerated. The first Indian born to attain sainthood was born in the western coastal town of Vasai, now an exurb of the city of Mumbai, he hailed from the town—then known as Baçaim in Portuguese, later Bassein in English—during the time the town was under Portuguese colonial rule. The festival of St. Gonsalo has come to be held on the first Sunday nearest to the neap tide following Christmas in Vasai.
St. Gonsalo Garcia was born as Gonçalo Garcia in 1557. Documents in the Lisbon Archives (ANTT) describe Gonsalo Garcia as a ‘natural de Agaçaim ’ or ‘resident of agashi’ village in Bassein. His father was a Portuguese soldier and his mother a Canarim (pl. canarins), that was how the Portuguese called the inhabitants of the Konkan. This term extended often to all the indigenous people from what was Portuguese India at the time. Modern scholars such as Gense and Conti accept the fact that Gonsalo’s mother was from Bassein.
According to Garcia's companion, Marcelo de Ribandeneira, who became a historian and considered as the most authentic source on the life of St. Gonsalo Garcia, the saint once told him that his mother was from Bassein and his father a Portuguese soldier. Hence the Papal Bull declaring Gonsalo Garcia as a saint mentions that he was Basseinite (A native of Bassein). As the child of a European father and an Indian mother he was a Mestiço in the Portuguese sense of term.
Gonsalo Garcia was very much delighted when he was accepted into the Franciscan order. In Manila, he came into the Franciscan missionary, Fr. Peter Baptista who remained as a companion until the very martyrdom. Gonsalo Garcia started his career as ‘dojuku’ or catechist in Manila. The main advantage for him was his ability to speak the Japanese language. From the different parts of Japan, the people began to send him invitations. It was at this time that the Spanish King wanted to send a delegation to Japan from Manila. The Spanish governor of Manila selected Fr. Peter Baptista as the leader of the delegation and since he did not know the Japanese language, Gonsalo Garcia was selected as his translator as well as his companion. Gonsalo was very happy with this offer that he immediately accepted the responsibility. The missionaries left Manila on 21 May 1593 and reached Hirado, a harbor in Japan, on 8 July 1593.

In Japan, Gonsalo Garcia became the center of attraction as he knew Japanese language well. He was the official member of Spanish translator of Fr. Peter Baptista. After facing some initial difficulties the Franciscan settled in Japan and began their missionary work in Kyoto, Osaka, etc. The Japanese shogun Toyotomi Hideyoshi, was very friendly with these Franciscans. It was a time when Jesuits were facing lot of opposition in Japan. The people of Japan appreciated the simple way of living adopted by these Franciscan missionaries. It helped them to accelerate their conversion program. Many Japanese, including their landlords accepted the Christian religion. Slowly Japan became the great center of evangelization for the Franciscan missionaries.
 On 4 January the persons sentenced to death began their journey from Kyoto. They traveled six hundred miles from Kyoto to Nagasaki through Sakai (Sakai, Osaka), Okayama, Hiroshima, Shimonoseki, and Karatsu (Karatsu, Saga). They reached Nagasaki on 4 February 1597. The next morning they were taken to a hill known as Nishigaoka where Terazawa Hazaburo, the brother of the governor of Nagasaki, had planned for the crucifixion to take place. As Gonsalo was prominent among the missionaries, he was given the middle place. There Gonsalo Garcia met one of his friend from Bassein fort, Francis Rodrigues Pinto, to whom he said: "My good friend, God be with you. I am going to heaven. A hearty hug to Fr. Sabastian Gonsalves on my behalf". The execution started at 10 o'clock in the morning. The culprits were so tired that they could not endure it for long and by 10.30am everything was over. The two soldiers who worked as executioners completed their task by stabbing their spears into the missionaries' chests. The Portuguese and Japanese Christians attending the execution broke past the guards and started soaking pieces of cloth in the blood of the executed, gathering lumps of the blood-soaked dirt, and tearing up their habits and kimonos for holy relics. The guards beat the relic-hunters away and order was reestablished. 

Terazawa positioned guards all around the hill, with strict orders not to allow anyone near the crosses. After completing the task Terazawa withdrew from the hill.After the sensational drama, the corpses of the victims were neglected by the local authorities thinking that they would be eaten by the vultures. But nearly for forty days they remained intact. Afterwards it was reported in The Examiner (12 March 1904) that the Portuguese brought the head of Gonsalo Garcia to India, which was kept in Bassein fort. They carried it to Goa when they left Bassein in 1739 (page 82). Since the author of the article does not mention the source of the information, it cannot be taken to be a historical fact. Then followed a series of miracles on the concerned hill in Nagasaki. So in 1627, thirty-five years after the crucifixion of the martyrs, Pope Urban VIII declared St. Gonsalo Garcia and his co-martyrs as

‘Blessed Ones’ and permitted the Jesuits and the Franciscans to venerate them. This permission was extended to other religions later on, but in 1629 the same Pope completed the beatification of these martyrs. The matter was neglected for more than two centuries. It was once again taken up in 1862 and on 8 June 1862 Pope Pius IX did the canonization of Gonsalo Garcia and his co-martyrs. Brother Gonsalo Garcia became St. Gonsalo Garcia. The first catholic Saint of India and the Indian Sub-Continent, and 8 June 2012 marked the 150th anniversary of his canonization.