Carneiro, Melchior
Carneiro, Melchior
(Carnero).
Missionary bishop; b. of a noble family at Coimbra, in Portugal; d. at Macao, 19 August, 1583. He entered the Society of Jesus, 25 April, 1543, was appointed in 1551 the first rector of the College of Evora, and shortly after transferred to the rectorship of the College of Lisbon. When, in 1553, Simon Rodriguez, the first provincial of Portugal, was summoned to Rome to answer charges made against his administration, the visitor, Nadal, assigned him Carneiro as a companion. In the meantime King John of Portugal, the great friend and patron of the Society, had written both to Pope Julius III and to St. Ignatius, requesting the appointment of a Jesuit as Patriarch of Ethiopia. The pope chose John Nugnez, giving him at the same time two coadjutors with the right of succession, Andrew Oviedo, titular bishop of Hieropolis, and Melchior Carneiro, of Nicæa. They were consecrated in 1555, and were the first Jesuits to be raised to the episcopal dignity. The pope had given them an order of obedience to accept consecration, and St. Ignatius acquiesced, considering that the dignity carried with it hardship and suffering rather than honour. Unable to enter his missionary field of Ethiopia, Carneiro set out for the Indies and landed at Goa. He laboured there on the Malabar coast until 1567, when he was appointed first bishop of Japan and China, which office he seems to have renounced soon after, for in 1569 Leonard de Saa succeeded him. He retired to the home of the Society of Jesus at Macao, where he died. Carneiro has written some letters of considerable historical interest, one from Mozambique, one from Goa, and two from Macao. They are printed in various collections.
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Mon. Hist. Soc. Jesu. (Madrid, 1894-96); Vita Ignatii Loyolæ, I-IV, passim; Literæ Quadrimestres, I-IV, passim; Sommervogel, Bibl. de la c. de J., II, s.v.
H.M. BROCK Transcribed by M. Donahue
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IIICopyright © 1908 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., CensorImprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
Carneiro, Melchior
a Portuguese missionary, was descended from a noble family of Coimbra. He had already gained some reputation as a scholar in his native place, when the Jesuits drew him into their ranks, in 1543. He was soon after made first rector of the college established by the congregation at Coimbra. Ignatius de Loyola having called him to Rome, he was appointed by pope Julius III bishop of Nice and coadjutor of the patriarch of Ethiopia. In 1555 he went to Goa; but his attempts to convert the Jews of Cochin were not more successful than were those for the conversion of the Christians of St. Thomas, upon the coast of Malabar. In 1567 he was appointed bishop of China and Japan, which office he held until his death, Aug. 19,1583. He wrote, Duas Cartas Sopre a Missdo. See Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Gneral, s.v.