Saint Francis Xavier
Priest
- Feast Day
- December 3
- Life
- 1506–1552
- Canonized
- 1622
- Order
- Society of Jesus (Jesuits)
- Born
- Castle of Xavier, Kingdom of Navarre (modern Spain)
Francisco de Jaso y Azpilicueta was born on April 7, 1506, at the Castle of Xavier in the Kingdom of Navarre. As a young man he went to study at the University of Paris, where in 1529 he shared a room with two older students who would change his life: Pierre Favre and Inigo de Loyola - the latter the future Saint Ignatius. Won over by Ignatius after long resistance, Francis was among the seven who pronounced the original vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience to the Pope at Montmartre in 1534, the founding act of the Society of Jesus. He was ordained priest in Venice in 1537.
In 1540 King John III of Portugal sought Jesuit missionaries for his Asian dominions; Ignatius designated Francis at the last moment. He sailed from Lisbon on April 7, 1541, and arrived at Goa on May 6, 1542. For the next ten and a half years he carried the Gospel along the coasts of India (especially among the pearl-fishers of the Fishery Coast), to Malacca, the Moluccas, and from August 1549 to November 1551 to Japan, where he made some two thousand converts and laid the foundation of the Japanese Church. Convinced that the evangelization of Japan required first the conversion of China (whose civilization Japan revered), he sailed for China in 1552 but, denied entry, died of fever on the small island of Shangchuan, six miles off the Chinese coast, on December 3, 1552, age forty-six. Pope Gregory XV canonized him together with Saint Ignatius on March 12, 1622. Pope Pius XI named him universal Patron of the Foreign Missions in 1927, alongside Saint Therese of Lisieux.
Francis Xavier is the model and patron of all who carry the Gospel to peoples who have never heard it. His evangelization of India and especially Japan, accomplished without the technological, financial, or political resources of later mission ages, remains the standard of apostolic zeal in the Society of Jesus and beyond.
Patronages
foreign missions · missionaries · India · Japan · Borneo · Australia · New Zealand
From Saint Francis Xavier
"Many people in these parts fail to become Christians for lack of someone to make them Christians."
Catholic Churches Named After Saint Francis Xavier
20 parishes on Catholic Church Times share Saint Francis Xavier's name. Find their Mass times, confession schedules, and adoration hours:
- St. Francis Xavier Nyakahoja — Mwanza
- St. Francis Xavier Mission, Empandeni — Plumtree
- St. Francis Xavier Nyakahoja — Mwanza
- St Francis Xavier's Church — East Bendigo, VIC
- Cathedral Parish - St Francis Xavier's Church, Railway Estate — Townsville, QLD
- St Francis Xavier Catholic Church — Mornington
- St. Francis Xavier University Chapel — Antigonish, NS
- St Francis Xavier's Catholic Church — Carfin, SCT
- St. Francis Xavier Quasi-Parish — Sta. Catalina, NEGROS ORIENTAL
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Davao City, XI
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Governor Generoso, DAVAO ORIENTAL
- Parish of St. Francis Xavier — Pandan, ANTIQUE
- Cathedral of St. Francis Xavier — Kabankalan City, NEGROS OCCIDENTAL
- St-François-Xavier / St. Francis Xavier — Cartier, ON
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Nasugbu, BATANGAS
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Antipolo, RIZAL
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Narvacan, ILOCOS SUR
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Mudeng, La Paz, CAR
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Lopez Jaena, MISAMIS OCCIDENTAL
- St. Francis Xavier Parish — Kapatagan, LANAO DEL NORTE
Sources