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BENAULIM

The Arabian Sea laps monotonously against the coast throwing white sprays against the reddish earth of India.

A curtain of slender and bent coconut palms stretches along the shore and covers the interior with a sea of thick, green tufts. Beneath a magnificent, verdant nave of mighty banyan trees, twining lianas and small shrubs of various green hues, the houses of the people are concealed, houses of beaten earth or wood or little brickwork, terrace houses with the roofs of tiles or of interwoven palm leaves.

The dwellings built in the best way possible, to protect the people against the heat and the heavy rains, which fall periodically on this land making it more fertile in vegetation. A tar road passes through the palm trees and connects the various groups of villages, which form the small town of Benaulim. In a green glade with huge tropical trees, rises the ancient façade of the Parish Church. Two tall spires decorated with baroque volutes frame the large portal, which opens on to the central nave with a wood barrel roof, at the end of which stands the main altar flanked on the sides by the benches of the collegiate. On the left as one enters a modest little chapel, is the baptismal font overhung by a canopy in the shape of a pointed tent. Behind that hill there is the sea, the great Arabian Sea, deep blue and rippled by the wind.

In the thick coconut grove, just near the lane, which joins the dwellings of the people of Benaulim, rose one of the many houses, which on a summer day was cheered by a birth.

Benaulim had on that Friday of April 21, 1651, one more son. A child about whom much would be spoken in his country and in the far off island of Ceylon.

The happy event occurred in the suffocating heat of the tropical summer, which preceded the rainy season. Eight days later a little procession of white dresses and sparkling saris of different colors passed beneath the stately palm trees and wended its way from the little reddish house to the Parish Church of St. John the Baptist. The tiny baby was introduced to the Parish Priest, the Jesuit Father Jacinto Pereira, who bestowed on him, with the baptismal water, the character of a Christian and the name of Joseph, in the Portuguese language: Jose, Sebastiano Vaz was the god-father and Speranza de Miranda was the god-mother.

Joseph was the son of Christopher Vaz and Maria de Miranda; the former hailed from the nearby village of Sancoale and the latter was from Benaulim. They were both of modest means. Christopher had a smattering of education. Besides being well versed in Konkani, he could also speak and write in Portuguese. Both parents were fervent Catholics and affectionate by nature. This was their third child; little Peter and a young sister Ann had already arrived to brighten the home.

There was nothing unusual about the event and it was soon forgotten in the sleepy hollow, which consisted of only a few huts and cottages.

Meanwhile little Joseph grew up and started toddling on the sands near the sea or on the banks of the Sale, the small river that flows into the Arabian Sea, not very far from Benaulim. His skin, similar to that of his countrymen, was of chocolate color, more or less dark and it contrasted with the whiteness of his simple dress. He was tall, thin and good-looking.

Joseph started his life like many boys in the great land of India. But the careful attention of his family had a great influence on him, due to his docile nature.

In fact, his parents and close relatives on his mother's side were really good Catholics, and as years passed by four of Maria's children and of her sister Angela Do Rego were ordained priests. They were the Oratorian Fathers Joseph, John, and Christopher Vaz and Joseph Carvalho, three of whom also became missionaries in Ceylon, with their cousin. Thus in the male line the Vaz family became extinct.

Joseph soon showed signs of gravity of manner and earnestness of disposition, which he inherited from his father, as his first biographer (his cousin Sebastian do Rego, who followed him in the priesthood and to the Oratorian Institute) records.

Already in his boyhood he showed a marked tendency towards piety; he devoted much of his free time to prayer, remaining absorbed in it, when he might have gone out to play with his brothers and friends. He loved to conceal his piety and did not like to be seen praying. His desire to be alone with God absorbed in silent meditation was the occasion of an accident, which could have done him much bodily harm. Once while his father was opening a door in the house, behind which little Joseph was lost in prayer, the child was dashed inadvertently and violently against a wall; but as the local tradition has it, the door was a shield for his body and left its imprint on him.

That he was not cold by nature but rather had warmth of affection is revealed in his later life. He was helped in his education by two of his aunts who, when they became widows, came to live at Christopher's house.

While he was attending the elementary school at Sancoale he was a model pupil; for he was diligent and docile, without being a plodder. The signs of the divine call became evident to him in the early years of his life; he soon expressed his desire to become a priest and at the same time showed a deep spirit of charity to others, particularly by offering to the poor the little money he was given at home. His father did not stand in the way of his noble desires; but he wanted to make sure that his son's ambitions were not those of an innocent child lacking experience.

In fact, later on, when from the behavior and success of Joseph in his studies there was enough evidence to show that the young man's desire was undoubtedly a call from heaven, Christopher did not hesitate to make all the sacrifices needed in order to give his son a proper education in preparation for his exalted mission.

Biographers of Fr. Joseph Vaz tell us that his father, at the time of his birth, had a sort of presentiment about the future of his son. In a notebook, after writing about the happy event in his home, recalling the baptism of his child, he jotted down the following sentence: "One day he will become a great man." Considered in the light of the events that followed this prediction acquires great value and justifies what his biographers have handed down to us, namely, that Christopher Vaz had a prophetic dream, at the time of his son's birth he saw a star rising in the sky. Be that as it may, the fact remains that Christopher was probably influenced by this foreboding and paid particular care to the education of his son.

Joseph also attended the high school at Benaulim, where he began to learn Latin. His stay in Benaulim was a source of great joy to him because he had more chances of practicing devotion and charity, and of attending Mass everyday in the beautiful church. Being unable to help the poor as he used to do in his hometown of Sancoale he practiced charity towards the souls in Purgatory, attending funerals and praying for souls of the dead or accompanying the Viaticum to the sick. When in the evening the bell rang to invite the people to pray for the souls of the dead, not only did he pray, but he also tried to induce his friends to do the same.

In his dealings with his schoolmates, he inspired them by his sense or order and his good example; He always did his best to help them, since he was the most gifted in the school. He always tried to avoid becoming a prefect of discipline lest he should be called upon to inflict corporal punishment on his classmates in lieu of his teacher.

When he finished high school he went to the University of Goa and took up rhetoric and the humanities, courses that were conducted in the capital by the Fathers of the Society of Jesus.

He spent six years at Goa; his residence was at the College of our Lady of the Rosary. He completed his literary studies at the Jesuit College of St. Paul. He then joined the Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas - directed by the Dominicans - for his philosophical and theological studies. He continued his austere way of life, devoting himself seriously to the preparation for the priesthood. His ardent desire to do good to others, without being observed, increased, as the time of his ordination approached. His general behavior was probably a positive reaction against the frivolities of life in Goa at the time and, of which the clergy also felt the effects.

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Contact: Rector (Vice Postulator - Goa)

Sanctuary of Blessed Joseph Vaz, 413 Blessed Joseph Vaz Road, P. O. Cortalim, SANCOALE - Goa - 403710-INDIA

Contact Office Tel: 00 91 832 2550263 / 2550517 e-mail: sanjovaz@blessedjosephvaz.org [www.blessedjosephvaz.org]