Blessed José de Anchieta

Apostle to Brasil

José de Anchieta (1534-1597) was sent to Brasil as a scholastic in the hope that the mild climate would improve his frail health. He never did overcome poor health but still managed to give 44 years of service, in the course of which he founded the cities of Rio de Janeiro and São Paolo and wrote plays and poems for which he is honored as the "Father of Brasilian National Literature."

He was born on Tenerife, in the Canary Islands and attended the Jesuit college in Coimbra, Portugal. He entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1551, but was sent to Brasil because he suffered a dislocation of the spine during his novitiate and his health did not promise to improve in Portugal. He landed in Bahia in 1553 and settled in São Vicente where he discovered that he could quickly learn the language of the Tupi-Guaraní people he met there. In January 1554 he accompanied Father Manuel de Nóbrega to a small village where they hoped to establish a mission and a school. They celebrated a Mass the day after they arrived; by chance it was the feast of St. Paul so they named the mission after him. Today's megapolis of São Paolo developed out of this mission.

Anchieta's assignment was to teach grammar and catechetical lessons to the native and Portuguese children and to teach Latin to those studying for the priesthood. He remained in this area doing missionary work for the next two decades. He also composed a Tupi grammar and dictionary.

The Portuguese missionary sometimes accompanied the superior whom he served as a translator. In 1563 he went with Nóbrega to negotiate peace between the Portuguese and the Tamoyo, a tribe who sometimes attacked the missions with the support of French Huguenots who wanted to get rid of the Portuguese. Anchieta had to remain with the Tamoyo as a hostage for three months when the negotiations dragged on. He coped with the loneliness by composing a poem in honor of Mary, writing the Latin verses in wet sand on the seashore and then committing them to memory. He transcribed the whole poem on paper once he finally returned to São Vicente, all 4,172 lines.

Anchieta was ordained a priest in June 1566; no bishop had been available earlier. The new priest went the following year with the superior, Nóbrega to found the settlement that grew into Rio de Janeiro. Then he was named superior of the two missions of São Vicente and São Paolo. During this part of his life he also started writing plays for his students to perform. In the Jesuit tradition, these dramas drew on Biblical and Catholic themes to instruct and edify people; they were the first dramas written in Brasil.

In 1577 Anchieta was appointed provincial and had to travel by boat to cover some 1,500 miles of coastland. By this time he had developed a hunchback that made travel difficult, especially walking on foot into the interior. Eventually he asked to be relieved of responsibilities as provincial because of his poor health, and he was put in charge of just one mission, where he managed to give another 10 years of missionary service. Finally, his health deteriorated further and he was moved in 1595 to Reritiba (which is today named after him) where he died at age 63. His body was taken back to Espírito Santo and buried in the Jesuit community.