GOAN CATHOLIC PRIESTS By Valmiki Faleiro This is not a Sunday ‘sermao.’ Six Goan Catholic Priests celebrated 50 years of their sacerdotal life last week. The affable Fr. Nascimento Mascarenhas also launched another book, on Catholicism (and churches) in Bardez. To them, this Sunday! The number of Goan priests is slowly dwindling. Fr. Nascimento bemoans that Saligao, his illustrious home village, has not produced a single vocation in the last 35 years. In the days of yore, priests were ubiquitous. That, perhaps, could have all to do with the near-regimental norm of having at least one priest per family among the educated. It was good status to have a family member belong to the clergy. Many such priests must have been reluctant products of their time, pushed by family pressures to the portals of the seminary. Beginning with Andre Vaz, a convert from Carambolim, ordained priest in 1558, Goa produced a multitude of men in soutane. Such was the abundance that the capital city, now Old Goa, was in jest said to have “more Churches than Christians.” Depending on size, churches had multiple altars, where priests celebrated Mass, in Latin, their backs toward the flock. There were multiple, simultaneous Masses. At its pinnacle in the 17th / 18th centuries, more than 40 priests celebrated a daily 120 Masses at Margao’s Holy Spirit Church, compared to a mere five, on a Sunday, now. The then quintessential Goan priest was not always regarded in flattering light. The popular stereotype, in fact, was looked upon as a greedy miser, more concerned with despatching worldly wealth to his family than repentant souls to God. He was a delight gastronomist and licentious in private life. What he lucidly preached in thunderous tones, laced with Latin quotes, from the high pulpit – there were no mikes and amplifiers then – was for the world to practice, not for him or his family to. That, of course, was a caricature image. Like that of the singularly classic reverend, Padre Antonio Dantas, the doting ‘Padre-Tio’ (‘Pa-tio,’ ‘Patiu,’ priest-uncle) of Jacob, in ‘Jacob & Dulce,’ the book I recently mentioned here. Reality was different. A Portuguese priest, Fr. Aleixo de Menezes, served as Goa Governor. Seventeen Goan priests were arrested on August 5, 1787 and 14 of them exiled in the failed Pinto Revolt of that year. The archetypal Goan Catholic Priest, though, was not only a spiritual but also a social leader, held in reverence. People genuflected or at least kissed the hand of a priest wherever one was met. As kids, we had to seek a priest’s blessings with folded hands, even if he was on his evening walk. Such was his eminence and fairness that he was the first court of appeal of neighbourly and even marital disputes. It was, thanks to him, that the Portuguese spread their hold in India – and almost converted half of North India to Christianity. The story goes that the great Moghul, Emperor Akbar, noticed a sharp increase in revenues from Bengal one year. He learnt that Catholic priests had refused to absolve Portuguese and Goan traders from the fort-factories of Bengal who had cheated on taxes. The priests insisted they first clear tax arrears, then return for a confession. Akbar was so impressed that he sent for a Catholic priest from Bengal. At the Delhi court, Fr. Juliano Pereira found himself inadequate to satiate Akbar’s studious mind. He suggested the Emperor invite some learned Jesuits from Goa. Led by 39-year-old Fr. Rodolfo Aquaviva, Fr. Antonio Monserrate (historian) and Fr. Francisco Henriques (a Muslim convert from Ormuz who acted as the Persian interpreter) arrived at Akbar’s court in Feb-1580. After three years of hoping to get Akbar embrace Christianity, the trio returned in May-1583. (Two months later, on July 15, Aquaviva was the first of history’s five Jesuits – among several civilians – martyred at Cuncolim, Salcete.) Vocations then were plenty. There were “priest families.” Three, of my recently departed uncle, Filipe Fernandes’ four brothers, from Benaulim, are priests. Their only sister was a nun. Today, vocations are a rarity, the seminary almost empty. Anything rare is valued even more. The life of a priest, admittedly, is not an easy one, especially with the vows of self-denial, poverty – and celibacy, which, I think is the most difficult to keep: it runs contra the law of nature and God’s own, “increase and multiply.” Every rule has its exceptions. But, do we cast away a basket of mangoes only because a few are rotten? This first Sunday of Lent, I bow to the many men in cassock I’ve admired. (ENDS) The Valmiki Faleiro weekly column at: http://www.goanet.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=330 ============================================================================== The above article appeared in the February 10, 2008 edition of the Herald, Goa
