Francis of Xabier was born in the family castle of Xabier, (toponymic name whose origin comes from "etxeberri" meaning "new house" in Basque) in the Pyrenean isthmus on 7 April 1506 according to a family register. He was born to an aristocratic family of the Kingdom of Navarre , the youngest son of Juan de Jaso, privy counsellor to King John III of Navarre (Jean d'Albret), and Doña Maria de Azpilcueta y Aznárez, sole heiress of two noble Navarrese families. He was thus related to the great theologian and philosopher Martín de Azpilcueta. Following the Basque surname custom of the time, he was named after his toponym; he use to sign his letters as Franciscus of Xabier. Notwithstanding different interpretations on his first language, no evidence suggests that Xabier's mother tongue was other than Basque, as stated by himself and confirmed by the sociolinguistic environment of the time, while he may have got in touch with Romance early due to the social status of his family, close to the royalty.
In 1512 under Ferdinand the Catholic as King of the first political unit referred to as Spain, was forced to join Spanish troops from both the Castilian and the Aragonese commanded by Fadrique Álvarez de Toledo, second Duke of Alba first invaded partially the Kingdom of Navarre. Three years later, Francis' father dies (1515) when he was only nine years old. In 1516, after a failed Navarrese-French attempt to expel the Spanish invaders off the kingdom, attempt in which Saint Francis' brothers had taken part, the Spanish Castilian kingdom Governor, Cardinal Cisneros, ordered family lands to be confiscated, the demolition of the outer wall, the gates and two towers of the family castle, the moat was filled, and the height of the keep was reduced in half,. Only the family residence inside the castle was left. For the following years with his family, till he left for studies in Paris in 1525, Saint Fancis' life in the Kingdom of Navarre, then partially occupied by Spain, was surrounded by a war that lasted over 18 years, ending with the Kingdom of Navarre partition into two territories, and the Kings of Navarre and some loyalists abandoning the south and moving to the north part of the Kingdom of Navarre (currently France).
In 1525 Francis Xabier went to study at the Collège Sainte-Barbe in Paris. There he met Ignatius of Loyola, who became his faithful companion, and Pierre Favre. While at the time he seemed destined for academic success in the line of his noble family, Francis turned to a life of Catholic missionary service. Together with Loyola and five others, he founded the Society of Jesus: on the 15 August 1534, in a small chapel in Montmartre, they made a vow of poverty, chastity and obedience, and also vowed to convert the Muslims in the Middle East (or, failing this, carry out the wishes of the Pope). Francis went, with the rest of the members of the newly papal-approved Jesuit order, to Venice, Italy, to be ordained to the priesthood, which took place on 24 June 1537. Towards the end of October, the seven companions reached Bologna, where they worked in the local hospital. After that, he served for a brief period in Rome as Ignatius' secretary.
Francis devoted much of his life to missions in Asia, after being appointed by King John III of Portugal to take charge as Apostolic Nuncio in Portuguese India, where the king believed that Christian values were eroding among the Portuguese. After successive appeals to the Pope asking for missionaries for the East Indies under the Padroado agreement, John III was enthusiastically advised by Diogo de Gouveia, rector of the Collège Sainte-Barbe, to draw the newly graduated youngsters that would establish the Society of Jesus.
Leaving Rome in 1540, Francis took with him a breviary, a catechism and a Latin book (De Instituione bene vivendi) written by the Croatian humanist Marko Marulic that had become popular in the counter-reformation. The breviary and the book by Marulic accompanied Francis on all of his voyages, and was used as source material for much of his preaching. According to a 1549 letters of F. Balthasar Gago in Goa, it was the only book that Francis read or studied.He left Lisbon on 7 April 1541 along with two other Jesuits and the new Viceroy Martim Afonso de Sousa, on board the Santiago. From August until March 1542 he remained in Mozambique, having reached Goa, then capital of Portuguese India's on May 6, 1542, and also visiting Vasai. There he was invited to head Saint Paul's College, a pioneer seminary for the education of secular priests that became the first jesuit headquarters in Asia, but soon departed, having spent the following three years in India.
In 1542, he left for his first missionary activity among the Paravas, katesar/kadaiyar Pattamkattiyars(head of fishery coast) and mukkuvars, pearl-fishers along the east coast of southern India, North of Cape Comorin (or Sup Santaz). He built nearly 40 churches along the coast with the fund of local headmen and king, out of this St. Stephen's Church, Kombuthurai find mention in his letters dated 1544.He lived in a sea cave in Manapad, intensively catechizing paravas and other children for three months in 1544. He then focused on converting the king of Travancore to Christianity and also visited Ceylon (now named Sri Lanka). Dissatisfied with the results of his activity, he set his sights eastward in 1545 and planned a missionary journey to Makassar on the island of Celebes (today's Indonesia).
As the first Jesuit in India, Francis had difficulty procuring success for his missionary trips. Instead of trying to approach Christianity through the traditions of the local religion and creating a nativised church as latter fellow Jesuit Matteo Ricci did in China, he was eager for change. His successors, such as de Nobili, Ricci, and Beschi, attempted to convert the noblemen first as a means to influence more people, while Francis had initially interacted most with the lower classes (later though, in Japan, Francis changed tack by paying tribute to the Emperor and seeking an audience with him). However Francis' mission was primarily, as ordered by King John III, to restore Christianity among the Portuguese settlers. Many of the Portuguese sailors had had illegitimate relationships with Indian women (miscegenation); Francis struggled to restore moral relations, and catechized many illegitimate children.After arriving in Portuguese Malacca in October of that year and waiting three months in vain for a ship to Makassar, he gave up the goal of his voyage and left Malacca on 1 January 1546, for Ambon Island where he stayed until mid-June. He then visited other Maluku Islands including Ternate and Morotai. Shortly after Easter, 1546, he returned to Ambon Island and later Malacca.
In Malacca in December, 1547, Francis met a Japanese named Anjiro. Anjiro had heard from Francis in 1545 and had travelled from Kagoshima to Malacca with the purpose of meeting with him. Having been charged with murder, Anjiro had fled Japan. He told Francis extensively about his former life and the customs and culture of his beloved homeland. Anjiro helped Francis as a mediator and translator for the mission to Japan that now seemed much more possible. "I asked [Anjiro] whether the Japanese would become Christians if I went with him to this country, and he replied that they would not do so immediately, but would first ask me many questions and see what I knew. Above all, they would want to see whether my life corresponded with my teaching."
Anjiro became the first Japanese Christian and adopted the name of 'Paulo de Santa Fe'.
Europeans had already come to Japan: the Portuguese had already landed in 1543 on the island of Tanegashima, where they introduced the first firearms to Japan.He returned to India in January 1548. The next 15 months were occupied with various journeys and administrative measures in India. Then, due to displeasure at what he considered un-Christian life and manners on the part of the Portuguese which impeded missionary work, he travelled from the South into East Asia. He left Goa on 15 April 1549, stopped at Malacca and visited Canton. He was accompanied by Anjiro, two other Japanese men, the father Cosme de Torrès and Brother João Fernandes. He had taken with him presents for the "King of Japan" since he was intending to introduce himself as the Apostolic Nuncio.
Shortly before leaving he had issued a famous instruction to F. Gaspar Barazeuz who was leaving to go to Ormuz (a kingdom on an island in the Persian Gulf, now part of Iran), that he should mix with sinners:
And if you wish to bring forth much fruit, both for yourselves and for your neighbors, and to live consoled, converse with sinners, making them unburden themselves to you. These are the living books by which you are to study, both for your preaching and for your own consolation. I do not say that you should not on occasion read written books . . . to support what you say against vices with authorities from the Holy Scriptures and examples from the lives of the saints.Francis of Xabier reached Japan on 27 July 1549, with Anjiro and three other Jesuits, but he was not permitted to enter any port his ship arrived at until 15 August when he went ashore at Kagoshima, the principal port of the province of Satsuma on the island of Kyūshū. As a representative of the Portuguese king, he was received in a friendly manner. Shimazu Takahisa (1514–1571), daimyo of Satsuma, gave a friendly reception to Francis on September 29, 1549, but in the following year he forbade the conversion of his subjects to Christianity under penalty of death; Christians in Kagoshima could not be given any catechism in the following years. The Portuguese missionary Pedro de Alcacova would later write in 1554:
In Cangoxima, the first place Father Master Francisco stopped at, there is a good number of Christians, although there is no one there to teach them; the shortage of laborers has prevented the whole kingdom from becoming Christian.Hosted by Anjiro's family until October 1550. From October to December, 1550, he resided in Yamaguchi. Shortly before Christmas, he left for Kyoto but failed to meet with the Emperor. He returned to Yamaguchi in March, 1551, where he was permitted to preach by the daimyo of the province. However, lacking fluency in the Japanese language, he had to limit himself to reading aloud the translation of a catechism.
Francis was the first Jesuit to go to Japan as a missionary. He brought with him paintings of the Madonna and the Madonna and Child. These paintings were used to help teach the Japanese about Christianity. There was a huge language barrier as Japanese was unlike other languages the missionaries had previously encountered. For a long time Francis struggled to learn the language. Artwork continued to play a role in Francis’ teachings in Asia.For forty-five years the Jesuits were the only missionaries in Asia, but the Franciscans also began proselytizing in Asia as well. Christian missionaries were later forced into exile, along with their assistants. Some were able to stay behind, however Christianity was then kept underground as to not be persecuted.
The Japanese people were not easily converted; many of the people were already Buddhist or Shinto. Francis tried to combat the disposition of some of the Japanese that a God who had created everything, including evil, could not be good. The concept of Hell was also a struggle; the Japanese were bothered by the idea of their ancestors living in Hell. Despite Francis’ different religion, he felt that they were good people, much like Europeans, and could be converted.
Francis of Xabier was welcomed by the Shingon monks since he used the word Dainichi for the Christian God; attempting to adapt the concept to local traditions. As Francis learned more about the religious nuances of the word, he changed to Deusu from the Latin and Portuguese Deus. The monks later realized that Francis was preaching a rival religion and grew more aggressive towards his attempts at conversion.
With the passage of time, his sojourn in Japan could be considered somewhat fruitful as attested by congregations established in Hirado, Yamaguchi and Bungo. Francis worked for more than two years in Japan and saw his successor-Jesuits established. He then decided to return to India. Historians debate the exact path he returned back by, but due to evidence attributed to the captain of his ship, he may have travelled through Tanegeshima and Minato, and avoided Kagoshima due to the hostility of the Daimyo. During his trip, a tempest forced him to stop on an island near Guangzhou, China where he saw the rich merchant Diogo Pereira, an old friend from Cochin, who showed him a letter from Portuguese being held prisoners in Guangzhou asking for a Portuguese ambassador to talk to the Chinese Emperor in their favor. Later during the voyage, he stopped at Malacca on 27 December 1551, and was back in Goa by January, 1552.
On 17 April he set sail with Diogo Pereira, leaving Goa on board the Santa Cruz for China. He introduced himself as Apostolic Nuncio and Pereira as ambassador of the King of Portugal. Shortly thereafter, he realized that he had forgotten his testimonial letters as an Apostolic Nuncio. Back in Malacca, he was confronted by the capitão Álvaro de Ataíde da Gama who now had total control over the harbor. The capitão refused to recognize his title of Nuncio, asked Pereira to resign from his title of ambassador, named a new crew for the ship and demanded the gifts for the Chinese Emperor be left in Malacca.
In late August, 1552, the Santa Cruz reached the Chinese island of Shangchuan, 14 km away from the southern coast of mainland China, near Taishan, Guangdong, 200 km south-west of what later became Hong Kong. At this time, he was only accompanied by a Jesuit student, Álvaro Ferreira, a Chinese man called António and a Malabar servant called Christopher. Around mid-November he sent a letter saying that a man had agreed to take him to the mainland in exchange for a large sum of money. Having sent back Álvaro Ferreira, he remained alone with António. St, Francis of Xabier died at Sancian from a fever on the 3 December 1552, while he was waiting for a boat that would agree to take him to mainland China.
