The professor and Assistant Dean of the Faculty of Humanities recently published the book «Misioneros en el Pacífico. Los intentos de evangelización de las islas Carolinas y Palaos (1710-1733)» [Missionaries in the Pacific: Evangelization Attempts in the Caroline Islands and Palau (1710-1733)], in which he recovers about thirty documents that help reconstruct that short period in history.
"The most important part of the book", said the
author, "are, in fact, these documents, which made it possible to relive
the first contacts between Western missionaries and the natives of the Caroline
Islands and Palau".
The book studies the period of territorial expansion of
the Catholic monarchy of Spain and political decline in the early 18th century.
It describes how a group of Jesuits decided to evangelize these islands located
to the south of the Mariana Islands and that formed part of the Spanish colony
of the Philippines at that time. Little was then known about the Caroline
Islands and Palau, which made it very difficult to find them. In the process,
some of the missionaries' ships sunk and several missionaries died.
Finally, Father Gian Antonio Cantova and Father Víctor
Walter made contact with the native people and began working to convert them to
Christianity. However, the cultural confrontation between the two civilizations
ultimately ended in bloodshed.
