Christianization of Goa
Encyclopedia
The indigenous population of the erstwhile Portuguese
colony of Goa
underwent a large-scale conversion to Christianity
after its conquest and occupation by the Portuguese Empire
, which was led by the voyager and adventurer Afonso de Albuquerque
in 1510. After conversion to Roman Catholicism, they were usually granted Portuguese citizenship. Almost all the present-day Goan Catholics
are descendants of these local converts to the religion. They constitute the largest Christian community in Goa and account for 25% of the total Catholic population in India
. The Mangalorean Catholic and Karwari Catholic
communities of the Indian state of Karnataka
are also largely descended from these Goan converts.
During the mid-16th century, the Portuguese colony of Goa, especially the city of Goa, was the center of Christianisation in the East. Evangelisation activities in Goa were divided in 1555 by the Portuguese viceroy of Goa, Pedro Mascarenhas
. He allotted Bardez
to the Franciscans, Tiswadi
to the Dominicans, and Salcette
, together with fifteen southeastern villages of Tiswadi, including Chorão
and Divar
, to the Jesuits. The city of Velha Goa was shared among all, since all the religious orders had their headquarters there. Prior to that, the Franciscans alone christianised Goa till 1542. Other less active orders that maintained a presence in Goa were the Augustines, Carmelites
, and Theatines
. The first mass conversions took place among the Brahmin
s of Divar, and the Kshatriya
s of Carambolim
. In 1534, Goa was made a diocese
and in 1557 an archdiocese. The Archbishop of Goa was the most important ecclesiastic of the East, and was from 1572 called the "Primate of the East". While the Portuguese rulers implemented state policies encouraging and even rewarding conversions among Hindu
subjects, it would be false to ascribe the large number of conversions solely to force. On the contrary, the rapid rise of converts in Goa was mostly the result of Portuguese economic and political control over the Hindus, who were vassals of the Portuguese crown.
This process of Christianisation was simultaneously accompanied by Lusitanisation, as the Christian converts typically assumed a Portuguese veneer. The most visible aspect was the discarding of old Hindu names for new Christian Portuguese names. The 1567 Provincial Council of Goa—under the presidency of the first Archbishop of Goa Gaspar Jorge de Leão Pereira
and after his retirement under that of George Themudo, Bishop of Cochin—passed over 115 decrees. One of them declared that the Goan Catholics would henceforth not be permitted to use their former Hindu names. Consequently, the converts typically had to adopt the surnames of the Portuguese priest, governor, soldier or layman who stood as godfather for their baptism
ceremony. For instance, the Boletim do Instituto Vasco da Gama lists the new names of some of the prominent ganvkars (Konkani
: Freeholders). Rama Prabhu, son of Dado Vithal Prabhu from Benaulim
, Salcette
, became Francisco Fernandes; Mahabal Pai, son of Nara Pai, became Manuel Fernandes in 1596. Mahabal Kamati of Curtorim
became Aleisco Menezes in 1607, while Chandrappa Naik of Gandaulim became António Dias in 1632. In 1595 Vittu Prabhu became Irmao de diago Soares and the son of Raulu Kamat became Manuel Pinto in Aldona
, Bardez
. Ram Kamat of Punola became Duarte Lobo in 1601, while Tados Irmaose of Anjuna
became João de Souza in 1658. Since in many cases, fathers and sons were not necessarily baptised in the presence of the same godfather, this would lead to them having different surnames. For instance in 1594, the son of Pero Parras, a ganvkar from Raia
acquired at baptism the new name of Sebastião Barbosa. Later in 1609, another of his sons converted and took the name of João Rangel. As a result, members of the same vangodd (clan) who initially all shared a common Hindu surname ended up adopting divergent Lusitanian ones.
However, the converted Hindus retained their mother tongue (which in most cases was Konkani) and caste status
, even after becoming Christian. Based on their previous caste affiliations, the new converts were usually lumped into new Catholic castes. The converts from the priestly Brahmin class were Bamonns
(Konkani: Brahmins). All Brahmin subcastes such as the Goud Saraswat Brahmins, Padye
s, the Daivadnya
s, and especially the goldsmiths and a few merchants, were lumped into the Christian caste of Bamonn. The converts from the Kshatriya and Vaishya Vani
castes became Chardos
(Kshatriyas); and those Vaishya Vanis who couldn't become Chardos formed a new caste Gauddos. Those converts from the labour class Shudra
became Sudirs (Shudras). The Bamonns, Chardos, and Gauddos have been traditionally seen as the high castes in the Goan Catholic caste hierarchy.
Bound by their rigid caste rules, these local converts (particularly the Brahmins) retained pride of caste and race, and very seldom inter-married with the Portuguese. Caste consciousness among the native Christians was so intense that they even maintained separate Church confraternities
dedicated to the perpetuation of the existing caste hierarchy. In church circles, the Bamonns and Chardos were rivals and frequently discriminated against each other. Caste discrimination even extended to the clergy. For instance, while there is evidence of Chardo priests since the late 17th century, only Bamonns, Mestiços
and foreigners were allowed to join the priesthood till then, and even from that period onwards, members of the clergy continued to hail overwhelmingly from the Bamonn caste. However, some non-Bamonn priests did achieve distinction. For instance, it was Fr. Estevão Jeremais Mascarenhas, a Gauddo by caste and member of parliament elected several times by public demand; who spoke of self-determination in 1853. The Portuguese church authorities decided to recruit Gauddos and Sudirs into the priesthood, in order to offset the increasing hostilities of the Bamonn and Chardo clerics. At least three Sudir priests trained by the Jesuits are known to have been condemned by the Inquisition
in 1736. The church authorities initially used the Bamonns and following the example of St. Francis Xavier, Chardos as Konkani and Marathi
interpreters in their parishes and missions.
Historian A.B. Bragança Pereira attributes the continued maintenance of the caste system to the mass conversion of entire villages, which led to the religious complexion of the whole village being christianised without affecting the existing caste structure. He posits that had the conversions taken place in individual instances, the converts would have formed into a homogenous community and the caste system would have disappeared among the Christians due to their inability to find marriage partners from the same caste.
According to historian José Gerson da Cunha
:
To this, historian C. R. Boxer
adds:
While the Portuguese intermarried with some locals and spawned a Mestiço class in Goa, they desired complete acculturation of the native Christians into Portuguese culture. The retention of the caste system and Hindu customs by the converts was contemptuously looked down upon by the Portuguese, who desired complete assimilation of the native Christians into their own culture. Consequently, they considered the native Christians to be inferior and practised social discrimination against them. The social attitudes of the Portuguese towards the native Christians is exemplified in a memorandum submitted by the Christians of Salcette to the Portuguese monarch João IV
in 1642:
The Portuguese clergy generally bore racial prejudices against their Goan counterparts. In their letters, they made frequent references to the fact that the native clergy were dark skinned, and that the parishioners had no respect for them as a result. The Franciscan parish priest of Colvale Church, Frei António de Encarnação, excommunicated for striking a Goan assistant, wrote a bitter and virulent essay against the native clergy wherein he called them ' negros chamados curas ' (Portuguese
: blacks called curates) and termed them as 'perverse' and 'insolent'. The Jesuits—with some exceptions, and Franciscans did not bother to learn the native language Konkani. The Franciscans further expanded on the viceregal decree of 1606 regarding making the natives illiterate in Konkani, and literate or semi-literate in Portuguese to qualify for receiving sacraments. The Archbishop of Goa Ignacio de Santa Theresa is known to have respected the native Goan clerics more than the Portuguese ones, whom he considered to be insolent and overbearing.
The Portuguese aimed to create a native citizenry loyal to their Empire, which they believed they could accomplish through mass conversions to Roman Catholicism. However, the converts largely turned out to be a useless citizenry as far as skills, trade, and ownership of capital were concerned.
Instead, the Portuguese relied on the Hindus (who were not considered full citizens of their Empire) to fulfill their personal and official ambitions, as they were seen to possess the capital, skills, contacts, and shrewdness required to sustain the Empire and its ambitions. The Portuguese and Hindus were great business and military
collaborators; religious affiliations did not matter. Therefore many Hindus who did not convert or even those who consistently refused to convert and overtly opposed Christendom continued to receive from the Portuguese more honours, favours and jobs than the Christians. This was done with the view of gaining their collaboration, not necessarily their conversion, although conversion was encouraged. For instance, the duty of collecting taxes on the cultivation of tobacco
in Goa was entrusted to the Hindu tax farmers, who were usually cruel to the native Christians while exercising their powers. With the support of the Portuguese government, they became the most feared and influential native class in the province. The tax farmers would unjustly levy fines on native Christians for the illegal cultivation of tobacco. They would ill treat the native womenfolk at the tollbooth on the pretext of searching for illegal goods. As a result, entire Christian village communities were deprived of considerable surplus income and many poor Christians were made into vagabonds or forced to flee Goa to the neighbouring kingdoms. The Portuguese colonial and church authorities did not employ politico-economic potentialities to achieve equality by raising the standard of living of the native Christians. The Jesuit report of 1686 stated thus: "They are very poor and surviving on the income of labour which brings in just enough for their sustenance."
In 1780, the Portuguese conquered from the Marathas
the concelho
s of Pernem
, Sanquelim and Sattari
. After a treaty signed on 29 January 1788 with the raja
of Sonda, they acquired the concelhos of Bicholim
, Antruz, Sanguem
, Quepem
and Canacona
. The influence of the clergy had significantly decreased by this time. The Jesuit order had been banned in 1759 and the political clout of the other religious orders had also considerably diminished. The Portuguese zeal for Christianisation gradually died down, so much so that by the last quarter of the 18th century, with the acquisition of the Novas Conquistas, they officially permitted the construction of temples in the territory and agreed not to interfere in the existing religious and social customs. Furthermore, no conversion work was undertaken there. By then, the situation had also greatly improved for the Hindus and Christians in the Velhas Conquistas, with no more anti-Hindu decrees being passed. After 1835, many Hindu families from the Novas Conquistas were permitted by the authorities to settle in the Velhas Conquistas and some Christian families were in turn encouraged to take the reverse route with the lure of land for a small annual rent.
In the late 1920s, prominent members of Goan Hindu society requested Vinayak Maharaj Masurkar, the prelate of a Vaishnava ashram
in Masur, Satara district
; to actively campaign for the 're-conversion' of Catholic Gaudas to Hinduism. Masurkar accepted, and together with his disciples, subsequently toured Gauda villages singing devotional bhakti
songs and performing puja
s. These means led a considerable number of Catholic Gaudas to declare willingness to come into the Hindu fold, and a Shuddhi
ceremony was carefully prepared. Their efforts was met with success when on 23 February 1928, many Catholic Gauda
s were converted en masse to Hinduism in a Shuddhi ceremony, notwithstanding the vehement opposition of the Roman Catholic Church and the Portuguese authorities. As part of their new religious identity, the converts were given Hindu names. However, the Portuguese government refused to grant them legal permission to change their names. Around 4,851 Catholic Gaudas from Tiswadi
, 2,174 from Ponda, 250 from Bicholim
and 329 from Sattari
became Hindus in this ceremony. The total number of Gauda converts was 7,815. The wider Hindu Gauda community refused to accept these neo-Hindus back into their fold, and they were now alienated by their former Christian coreligionists. These neo-Hindus developed into a separate endogamous community, and are now referred to as Nav-Hindu Gaudas (New Hindu Gaudas).
Since 1851, the Christian population of Goa has been facing a continual decline. Consequentially, the percentage of the Christian population (once a majority) has been shifting in favour of the Hindus. As per the data available, Christians constituted 63.83 percent (232,189 individuals), whereas Hindus comprised just 35.42 percent (128,824 individuals) in the 1851 census. The next census was carried out in 1881, according to which Christians were 58 percent, while Hindus were 42 percent of the population. The percentage of the Christian population went on declining in the subsequent censuses for the years 1900, 1910, 1921, 1931, 1950, and 1960, with the percentage of Christians in the censuses being 54.83 percent, 54.76 percent, 52.29 percent, 49.00 percent, 42.18 percent, and 38.07 percent. The reason for this was the out-migration of Christians and the return of the descendants of Hindu migrants who had fled Goa. As of 1998, Goa's population was estimated to be just over 1.3 million persons, of which 62 percent (806,000 individuals) were Hindu and 34 percent (442,000 individuals) were Christians.
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
colony of Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...
underwent a large-scale conversion to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
after its conquest and occupation by the Portuguese Empire
Portuguese Empire
The Portuguese Empire , also known as the Portuguese Overseas Empire or the Portuguese Colonial Empire , was the first global empire in history...
, which was led by the voyager and adventurer Afonso de Albuquerque
Afonso de Albuquerque
Afonso de Albuquerque[p][n] was a Portuguese fidalgo, or nobleman, an admiral whose military and administrative activities as second governor of Portuguese India conquered and established the Portuguese colonial empire in the Indian Ocean...
in 1510. After conversion to Roman Catholicism, they were usually granted Portuguese citizenship. Almost all the present-day Goan Catholics
Goan Catholics
The Goan Catholics are an ethno-religious community of Roman Catholics and their descendants from the state of Goa, located on the west coast of India. They are Konkani people and speak the Konkani language...
are descendants of these local converts to the religion. They constitute the largest Christian community in Goa and account for 25% of the total Catholic population in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. The Mangalorean Catholic and Karwari Catholic
Karwari Catholics
Karwari Catholics are Roman Catholics from Karwar and the Uttara Kannada district on the western coast of India, and their descendants. They are Konkani people and speak the Konkani language....
communities of the Indian state of Karnataka
Karnataka
Karnataka , the land of the Kannadigas, is a state in South West India. It was created on 1 November 1956, with the passing of the States Reorganisation Act and this day is annually celebrated as Karnataka Rajyotsava...
are also largely descended from these Goan converts.
During the mid-16th century, the Portuguese colony of Goa, especially the city of Goa, was the center of Christianisation in the East. Evangelisation activities in Goa were divided in 1555 by the Portuguese viceroy of Goa, Pedro Mascarenhas
Pedro Mascarenhas
Pedro Mascarenhas was a Portuguese explorer and colonial administrator. He was the first European to discover the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean in 1512...
. He allotted Bardez
Bardez
Bardez is the name of a region and taluka in North Goa. The name is credited to the Brahmin immigrants who migrated to the Konkan via Magadha in Gangetic India from Aryavarta, in the north-western part of the Indian sub-continent. Bardez or more properly Bara desh means "twelve countries"...
to the Franciscans, Tiswadi
Tiswadi
Tiswadi is a taluka of North Goa district of the state of Goa, India.The word Tiswadi itself means thirty settlements. It refers to the thirty settlements in which the Goud Saraswat Brahmins settled when they migrated to Goa. It is geographically an Island with the Mandovi river forming its...
to the Dominicans, and Salcette
Salcette
Salcette , is a taluka of South Goa District in the Indian state of Goa. Its administrative and economic headquarters is Margao. It is largely coterminous with a region called Sashti , which comprised, by local tradition, sixty-six villages, hence the name. However, it also includes the taluka of...
, together with fifteen southeastern villages of Tiswadi, including Chorão
Chorao
Chorao is an island along the river Mandovi near Panaji, Goa, India.The island was historically called Chudamani, meaning stunning precious stone in Sanskrit. Local legends tell of the islands emerging from diamonds that were thrown away by Yashoda the mother of Lord Krishna. The Islanders call...
and Divar
Divar
The island of Divar lies in the Mandovi river in the Indian state of Goa.-Location:...
, to the Jesuits. The city of Velha Goa was shared among all, since all the religious orders had their headquarters there. Prior to that, the Franciscans alone christianised Goa till 1542. Other less active orders that maintained a presence in Goa were the Augustines, Carmelites
Carmelites
The Order of the Brothers of Our Lady of Mount Carmel or Carmelites is a Catholic religious order perhaps founded in the 12th century on Mount Carmel, hence its name. However, historical records about its origin remain uncertain...
, and Theatines
Theatines
The Theatines or the Congregation of Clerks Regular of the Divine Providence are a male religious order of the Catholic Church, with the post-nominal initials "C.R."-Foundation:...
. The first mass conversions took place among the Brahmin
Brahmin
Brahmin Brahman, Brahma and Brahmin.Brahman, Brahmin and Brahma have different meanings. Brahman refers to the Supreme Self...
s of Divar, and the Kshatriya
Kshatriya
*For the Bollywood film of the same name see Kshatriya Kshatriya or Kashtriya, meaning warrior, is one of the four varnas in Hinduism...
s of Carambolim
Karmali
Karmali is a village in North Goa district, Goa, India.-External links:* *...
. In 1534, Goa was made a diocese
Diocese
A diocese is the district or see under the supervision of a bishop. It is divided into parishes.An archdiocese is more significant than a diocese. An archdiocese is presided over by an archbishop whose see may have or had importance due to size or historical significance...
and in 1557 an archdiocese. The Archbishop of Goa was the most important ecclesiastic of the East, and was from 1572 called the "Primate of the East". While the Portuguese rulers implemented state policies encouraging and even rewarding conversions among Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
subjects, it would be false to ascribe the large number of conversions solely to force. On the contrary, the rapid rise of converts in Goa was mostly the result of Portuguese economic and political control over the Hindus, who were vassals of the Portuguese crown.
This process of Christianisation was simultaneously accompanied by Lusitanisation, as the Christian converts typically assumed a Portuguese veneer. The most visible aspect was the discarding of old Hindu names for new Christian Portuguese names. The 1567 Provincial Council of Goa—under the presidency of the first Archbishop of Goa Gaspar Jorge de Leão Pereira
Gaspar Jorge de Leão Pereira
Gaspar Jorge de Leão Pereira, or simply Gaspar de Leão Pereira or Gaspar de Leão was the first Archbishop of Goa....
and after his retirement under that of George Themudo, Bishop of Cochin—passed over 115 decrees. One of them declared that the Goan Catholics would henceforth not be permitted to use their former Hindu names. Consequently, the converts typically had to adopt the surnames of the Portuguese priest, governor, soldier or layman who stood as godfather for their baptism
Baptism
In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...
ceremony. For instance, the Boletim do Instituto Vasco da Gama lists the new names of some of the prominent ganvkars (Konkani
Konkani language
KonkaniKonkani is a name given to a group of several cognate dialects spoken along the narrow strip of land called Konkan, on the west coast of India. This is, however, somewhat an over-generalisation. Geographically, Konkan is defined roughly as the area between the river Damanganga to the north...
: Freeholders). Rama Prabhu, son of Dado Vithal Prabhu from Benaulim
Benaulim
Benaulim also known as Banavali , is a census town in South Goa district in the state of Goa, India. It is a beach town a little south of Margao in Goa, India....
, Salcette
Salcette
Salcette , is a taluka of South Goa District in the Indian state of Goa. Its administrative and economic headquarters is Margao. It is largely coterminous with a region called Sashti , which comprised, by local tradition, sixty-six villages, hence the name. However, it also includes the taluka of...
, became Francisco Fernandes; Mahabal Pai, son of Nara Pai, became Manuel Fernandes in 1596. Mahabal Kamati of Curtorim
Curtorim
Curtorim is a town in the Salcette taluka of South Goa district in the state of Goa, India. It is located on the west coast of India.-Geography:Curtorim is located at . It has an average elevation of 38 metres .-History:...
became Aleisco Menezes in 1607, while Chandrappa Naik of Gandaulim became António Dias in 1632. In 1595 Vittu Prabhu became Irmao de diago Soares and the son of Raulu Kamat became Manuel Pinto in Aldona
Aldona
Aldona is a village in Bardez, and a census town in the North Goa district in the state of Goa, India.-Geography:Aldona is located at . It has an average elevation of 19 metres .-Demographics:...
, Bardez
Bardez
Bardez is the name of a region and taluka in North Goa. The name is credited to the Brahmin immigrants who migrated to the Konkan via Magadha in Gangetic India from Aryavarta, in the north-western part of the Indian sub-continent. Bardez or more properly Bara desh means "twelve countries"...
. Ram Kamat of Punola became Duarte Lobo in 1601, while Tados Irmaose of Anjuna
Anjuna
Anjuna is a village in Goa, one of the twelve Brahmin comunidades of Bardez.Its church, St. Michael's Church, Anjuna, founded in 1595, is dedicated to S. Miguel, and celebrates the feasts of S. Miguel and Nossa Senhora Advogada . There are three large chapels in the parish: the one to S...
became João de Souza in 1658. Since in many cases, fathers and sons were not necessarily baptised in the presence of the same godfather, this would lead to them having different surnames. For instance in 1594, the son of Pero Parras, a ganvkar from Raia
Raia
Raia may refer to:* Royal Australian Institute of Architects, a professional body for architects in Australia* Raia , a small village in Goa, India, about 6 km from Margao on the way to Loutolim...
acquired at baptism the new name of Sebastião Barbosa. Later in 1609, another of his sons converted and took the name of João Rangel. As a result, members of the same vangodd (clan) who initially all shared a common Hindu surname ended up adopting divergent Lusitanian ones.
However, the converted Hindus retained their mother tongue (which in most cases was Konkani) and caste status
Caste system in India
The Indian caste system is a system of social stratification and social restriction in India in which communities are defined by thousands of endogamous hereditary groups called Jātis....
, even after becoming Christian. Based on their previous caste affiliations, the new converts were usually lumped into new Catholic castes. The converts from the priestly Brahmin class were Bamonns
Roman Catholic Brahmin
The Roman Catholic Brahmin, also referred to asBamonn in Konkani, is a caste among the Goan and Mangalorean Catholics, of modern-day descendants of Konkani Brahmin converts to Roman Catholicism.-Origins:In Goa, the Brahmins were originally engaged in the priestly occupation, but had taken up...
(Konkani: Brahmins). All Brahmin subcastes such as the Goud Saraswat Brahmins, Padye
Padye
Padye Brahmin community hails from Goa, commonly known as "Bhatt" ,they speak a unique dialect of Konkani known as "Bhati Bhasha".-Etymology:...
s, the Daivadnya
Daivadnya
*दाते पंचांग,गोत्रावळी "Gotravali" published by "Date Panchang", Date's Almanac Pvt Ltd, Solapur,India **"Genetics of Castes and Tribes of India:Indian Population Milieu" by M. K. Bhasin, Department of Anthropology, University of Delhi, Delhi 110 007, India...
s, and especially the goldsmiths and a few merchants, were lumped into the Christian caste of Bamonn. The converts from the Kshatriya and Vaishya Vani
Vaishya Vani
Vaishya Vani, is a trader/merchant community hailing from the western coast of India, residing in the Konkan division of Maharashtra, Goa,some parts of coastal and central Karnataka, and Kerala. This community commonly known as Vanis and sometimes Kudali Vanis...
castes became Chardos
Roman Catholic Kshatriya
The Roman Catholic Kshatriya is a caste among the Goan and Mangalorean Catholics, of modern-day descendants of Goan Kshatriya and a few Vaishya converts to Roman Catholicism. They are respectively known as Chardo in the Goan Catholic dialects of Konkani The Roman Catholic Kshatriya is a caste among...
(Kshatriyas); and those Vaishya Vanis who couldn't become Chardos formed a new caste Gauddos. Those converts from the labour class Shudra
Shudra
Shudra is the fourth Varna, as prescribed in the Purusha Sukta of the Rig veda, which constitutes society into four varnas or Chaturvarna. The other three varnas are Brahmans - priests, Kshatriya - those with governing functions, Vaishya - agriculturalists, cattle rearers and traders...
became Sudirs (Shudras). The Bamonns, Chardos, and Gauddos have been traditionally seen as the high castes in the Goan Catholic caste hierarchy.
Bound by their rigid caste rules, these local converts (particularly the Brahmins) retained pride of caste and race, and very seldom inter-married with the Portuguese. Caste consciousness among the native Christians was so intense that they even maintained separate Church confraternities
Confraternity
A confraternity is normally a Roman Catholic or Orthodox organization of lay people created for the purpose of promoting special works of Christian charity or piety, and approved by the Church hierarchy...
dedicated to the perpetuation of the existing caste hierarchy. In church circles, the Bamonns and Chardos were rivals and frequently discriminated against each other. Caste discrimination even extended to the clergy. For instance, while there is evidence of Chardo priests since the late 17th century, only Bamonns, Mestiços
Mestizo
Mestizo is a term traditionally used in Latin America, Philippines and Spain for people of mixed European and Native American heritage or descent...
and foreigners were allowed to join the priesthood till then, and even from that period onwards, members of the clergy continued to hail overwhelmingly from the Bamonn caste. However, some non-Bamonn priests did achieve distinction. For instance, it was Fr. Estevão Jeremais Mascarenhas, a Gauddo by caste and member of parliament elected several times by public demand; who spoke of self-determination in 1853. The Portuguese church authorities decided to recruit Gauddos and Sudirs into the priesthood, in order to offset the increasing hostilities of the Bamonn and Chardo clerics. At least three Sudir priests trained by the Jesuits are known to have been condemned by the Inquisition
Goa Inquisition
The Goa Inquisition was the office of the Inquisition acting in the Indian state of Goa and the rest of the Portuguese empire in Asia. It was established in 1560, briefly suppressed from 1774–1778, and finally abolished in 1812. The Goan Inquisition is considered a blot on the history of...
in 1736. The church authorities initially used the Bamonns and following the example of St. Francis Xavier, Chardos as Konkani and Marathi
Marathi language
Marathi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western and central India. It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are over 68 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi has the fourth largest number of native speakers in India and is the fifteenth most...
interpreters in their parishes and missions.
Historian A.B. Bragança Pereira attributes the continued maintenance of the caste system to the mass conversion of entire villages, which led to the religious complexion of the whole village being christianised without affecting the existing caste structure. He posits that had the conversions taken place in individual instances, the converts would have formed into a homogenous community and the caste system would have disappeared among the Christians due to their inability to find marriage partners from the same caste.
According to historian José Gerson da Cunha
José Gerson da Cunha
José Gerson da Cunha was an Indo-Portuguese physician who achieved international renown as an orientalist, historian, linguist and numismatist.- Early life and medical career:...
:
"The spread of Christianity in the Southern Konkan was not a caste levelling process. It simply conciliated old prejudices with new privileges. A converted Brahman became a Christian in faith alone, retaining all the social rights of Hinduism, and transmitting all caste prerogatives, untainted by any admixture of foreign or low caste blood, through generations to his current aristocratic posterity."
To this, historian C. R. Boxer
C. R. Boxer
Charles Ralph Boxer FBA was a distinguished historian of Dutch and Portuguese maritime and colonial history.-Education and Military Career:...
adds:
"Nothing is more erroneous than the common perception that all Goans have a considerable dose of Portuguese blood in their veins. The great majority are ethnically Indians, though their centuries-old adoption of the Roman Catholic religion, and of the Portuguese language and mores, together with their assumption of Portuguese names, have firmly ingrained them in the Portuguese cultural orbit."
While the Portuguese intermarried with some locals and spawned a Mestiço class in Goa, they desired complete acculturation of the native Christians into Portuguese culture. The retention of the caste system and Hindu customs by the converts was contemptuously looked down upon by the Portuguese, who desired complete assimilation of the native Christians into their own culture. Consequently, they considered the native Christians to be inferior and practised social discrimination against them. The social attitudes of the Portuguese towards the native Christians is exemplified in a memorandum submitted by the Christians of Salcette to the Portuguese monarch João IV
John IV of Portugal
|-|John IV was the King of Portugal and the Algarves from 1640 to his death. He was the grandson of Catherine, Duchess of Braganza, who had in 1580 claimed the Portuguese crown and sparked the struggle for the throne of Portugal. John was nicknamed John the Restorer...
in 1642:
"It is very painful to realise that when our people were Hindus, they were better honoured and respected in the courts of Hindu and Muslim rulers, but after conversion we have lost much of our self-respect. A Portuguese nobleman or Minister shows greater respect to a low caste Hindu than to a Christian of high caste. It happens quite often that a Hindu is given a chair to sit and a native Christian stands. This attitude of the Portuguese had moved many Christians in the recent years to go to the city with the headgears and the tunic of the kind the Hindus wear. There is no way of talking to Hindus about conversion any more, because they reply that they are not in a hurry to lose their self-respect."
The Portuguese clergy generally bore racial prejudices against their Goan counterparts. In their letters, they made frequent references to the fact that the native clergy were dark skinned, and that the parishioners had no respect for them as a result. The Franciscan parish priest of Colvale Church, Frei António de Encarnação, excommunicated for striking a Goan assistant, wrote a bitter and virulent essay against the native clergy wherein he called them ' negros chamados curas ' (Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
: blacks called curates) and termed them as 'perverse' and 'insolent'. The Jesuits—with some exceptions, and Franciscans did not bother to learn the native language Konkani. The Franciscans further expanded on the viceregal decree of 1606 regarding making the natives illiterate in Konkani, and literate or semi-literate in Portuguese to qualify for receiving sacraments. The Archbishop of Goa Ignacio de Santa Theresa is known to have respected the native Goan clerics more than the Portuguese ones, whom he considered to be insolent and overbearing.
The Portuguese aimed to create a native citizenry loyal to their Empire, which they believed they could accomplish through mass conversions to Roman Catholicism. However, the converts largely turned out to be a useless citizenry as far as skills, trade, and ownership of capital were concerned.
Instead, the Portuguese relied on the Hindus (who were not considered full citizens of their Empire) to fulfill their personal and official ambitions, as they were seen to possess the capital, skills, contacts, and shrewdness required to sustain the Empire and its ambitions. The Portuguese and Hindus were great business and military
collaborators; religious affiliations did not matter. Therefore many Hindus who did not convert or even those who consistently refused to convert and overtly opposed Christendom continued to receive from the Portuguese more honours, favours and jobs than the Christians. This was done with the view of gaining their collaboration, not necessarily their conversion, although conversion was encouraged. For instance, the duty of collecting taxes on the cultivation of tobacco
Tobacco
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...
in Goa was entrusted to the Hindu tax farmers, who were usually cruel to the native Christians while exercising their powers. With the support of the Portuguese government, they became the most feared and influential native class in the province. The tax farmers would unjustly levy fines on native Christians for the illegal cultivation of tobacco. They would ill treat the native womenfolk at the tollbooth on the pretext of searching for illegal goods. As a result, entire Christian village communities were deprived of considerable surplus income and many poor Christians were made into vagabonds or forced to flee Goa to the neighbouring kingdoms. The Portuguese colonial and church authorities did not employ politico-economic potentialities to achieve equality by raising the standard of living of the native Christians. The Jesuit report of 1686 stated thus: "They are very poor and surviving on the income of labour which brings in just enough for their sustenance."
In 1780, the Portuguese conquered from the Marathas
Maratha Empire
The Maratha Empire or the Maratha Confederacy was an Indian imperial power that existed from 1674 to 1818. At its peak, the empire covered much of South Asia, encompassing a territory of over 2.8 million km²....
the concelho
Concelho
Concelho , in the Portuguese language, is the word municipality, when referring to the territory. The word município is used when municipality means the organ of State...
s of Pernem
Pernem
Pernem is a northmost administrative region or Taluka in North Goa. It is also the name of the town of Pernem, which is its headquarters. It has a Municipal Council...
, Sanquelim and Sattari
Sattari
Sattari is a taluka on North East side of Goa known for its greenary and dense forest. Its headquarters is Valpoi . It is the 'Fenny capital' of Goa. The Western Ghats form the eastern part of the Sattari Taluka. The Mhadei River is considered to be the lifeline of Sattari. It has a...
. After a treaty signed on 29 January 1788 with the raja
Raja
Raja is an Indian term for a monarch, or princely ruler of the Kshatriya varna...
of Sonda, they acquired the concelhos of Bicholim
Bicholim
Bicholim is a city and a municipal council in North Goa district in the state of Goa, India. It is a town in the territory of Goa, and the headquarters of the concelho of the same name; the Concelho of Bicholim, located in the north-east quarter is one of the seven that make up the Novas...
, Antruz, Sanguem
Sanguem
Sanguem is a city and a municipal council in South Goa district in the Indian state of Goa.Notable landmarks include the Sagameshwar Temple, Bhagwan Mahaveer Sanctuary and Mollem National Park and the Salaulim Dam.-Geography:...
, Quepem
Quepem
Quepem is a town and a municipal council in South Goa district in the Indian state of Goa.The town is the administrative capital for the Quepem district. Curchorem and Sanvordem are the a major towns located in the Quepem District.-Geography:...
and Canacona
Canacona
Canacona is an administrative region in south Goa, in India.Canacona is one of the five talukas that constitute the South Goa district. It is bounded on the north by the taluka of Quepem, on the northeast by Sanguem, on the south by the state of Karnataka, and on the west by the Arabian Sea...
. The influence of the clergy had significantly decreased by this time. The Jesuit order had been banned in 1759 and the political clout of the other religious orders had also considerably diminished. The Portuguese zeal for Christianisation gradually died down, so much so that by the last quarter of the 18th century, with the acquisition of the Novas Conquistas, they officially permitted the construction of temples in the territory and agreed not to interfere in the existing religious and social customs. Furthermore, no conversion work was undertaken there. By then, the situation had also greatly improved for the Hindus and Christians in the Velhas Conquistas, with no more anti-Hindu decrees being passed. After 1835, many Hindu families from the Novas Conquistas were permitted by the authorities to settle in the Velhas Conquistas and some Christian families were in turn encouraged to take the reverse route with the lure of land for a small annual rent.
In the late 1920s, prominent members of Goan Hindu society requested Vinayak Maharaj Masurkar, the prelate of a Vaishnava ashram
Ashram
Traditionally, an ashram is a spiritual hermitage. Additionally, today the term ashram often denotes a locus of Indian cultural activity such as yoga, music study or religious instruction, the moral equivalent of a studio or dojo....
in Masur, Satara district
Satara district
Satara District is a district of Maharashtra state in western India with an area of 10,480 km² and a population of 2,808,994 of which 14.17% were urban . Satara is the capital of the district and other major towns include Wai, Karad, Koregaon, Koyananagar, Rahimatpur, Phaltan, Mahabaleshwar...
; to actively campaign for the 're-conversion' of Catholic Gaudas to Hinduism. Masurkar accepted, and together with his disciples, subsequently toured Gauda villages singing devotional bhakti
Bhakti
In Hinduism Bhakti is religious devotion in the form of active involvement of a devotee in worship of the divine.Within monotheistic Hinduism, it is the love felt by the worshipper towards the personal God, a concept expressed in Hindu theology as Svayam Bhagavan.Bhakti can be used of either...
songs and performing puja
Puja
Pūjā or alternative transliteration Pooja, is a religious ritual performed by Hindus as an offering to various deities, distinguished persons, or special guests...
s. These means led a considerable number of Catholic Gaudas to declare willingness to come into the Hindu fold, and a Shuddhi
Shuddhi
Shuddhi is Sanskrit for purification. In Hinduism it is a part of worship. It also sometimes refers to reverting to Hinduism after converting from Hinduism to another religion.-Shuddhi movement:...
ceremony was carefully prepared. Their efforts was met with success when on 23 February 1928, many Catholic Gauda
Gauda and Kunbi
Gaudas and Kunbis are aboriginal people residing in the coastal Indian state of Goa. They are of Proto-Australoid stock and are believed to be the original inhabitants of Konkan...
s were converted en masse to Hinduism in a Shuddhi ceremony, notwithstanding the vehement opposition of the Roman Catholic Church and the Portuguese authorities. As part of their new religious identity, the converts were given Hindu names. However, the Portuguese government refused to grant them legal permission to change their names. Around 4,851 Catholic Gaudas from Tiswadi
Tiswadi
Tiswadi is a taluka of North Goa district of the state of Goa, India.The word Tiswadi itself means thirty settlements. It refers to the thirty settlements in which the Goud Saraswat Brahmins settled when they migrated to Goa. It is geographically an Island with the Mandovi river forming its...
, 2,174 from Ponda, 250 from Bicholim
Bicholim
Bicholim is a city and a municipal council in North Goa district in the state of Goa, India. It is a town in the territory of Goa, and the headquarters of the concelho of the same name; the Concelho of Bicholim, located in the north-east quarter is one of the seven that make up the Novas...
and 329 from Sattari
Sattari
Sattari is a taluka on North East side of Goa known for its greenary and dense forest. Its headquarters is Valpoi . It is the 'Fenny capital' of Goa. The Western Ghats form the eastern part of the Sattari Taluka. The Mhadei River is considered to be the lifeline of Sattari. It has a...
became Hindus in this ceremony. The total number of Gauda converts was 7,815. The wider Hindu Gauda community refused to accept these neo-Hindus back into their fold, and they were now alienated by their former Christian coreligionists. These neo-Hindus developed into a separate endogamous community, and are now referred to as Nav-Hindu Gaudas (New Hindu Gaudas).
Since 1851, the Christian population of Goa has been facing a continual decline. Consequentially, the percentage of the Christian population (once a majority) has been shifting in favour of the Hindus. As per the data available, Christians constituted 63.83 percent (232,189 individuals), whereas Hindus comprised just 35.42 percent (128,824 individuals) in the 1851 census. The next census was carried out in 1881, according to which Christians were 58 percent, while Hindus were 42 percent of the population. The percentage of the Christian population went on declining in the subsequent censuses for the years 1900, 1910, 1921, 1931, 1950, and 1960, with the percentage of Christians in the censuses being 54.83 percent, 54.76 percent, 52.29 percent, 49.00 percent, 42.18 percent, and 38.07 percent. The reason for this was the out-migration of Christians and the return of the descendants of Hindu migrants who had fled Goa. As of 1998, Goa's population was estimated to be just over 1.3 million persons, of which 62 percent (806,000 individuals) were Hindu and 34 percent (442,000 individuals) were Christians.
See also
- Christianity in GoaChristianity in GoaChristianity is the second largest religious grouping in Goa, India. According to the 2001 census, 27% of the population are Christian, while 66% are Hindu...
- Christianity in IndiaChristianity in IndiaChristianity is India's third-largest religion, with approximately 24 million followers, constituting 2.3% of India's population. The works of scholars and Eastern Christian writings and 14th century Portuguese missionaries created an illusion to convert Indians that Christianity was introduced to...
- Conspiracy of the PintosConspiracy Of The PintosConspiracy of the Pintos, also known as Conspiracy of Goa, the Pinto Revolt or the Pinto Conspiracy, and in Portuguese as A Conjuração dos Pintos, was a rebellion against Portuguese rule in Goa in 1787...
- Cuncolim Revolt
- Goa InquisitionGoa InquisitionThe Goa Inquisition was the office of the Inquisition acting in the Indian state of Goa and the rest of the Portuguese empire in Asia. It was established in 1560, briefly suppressed from 1774–1778, and finally abolished in 1812. The Goan Inquisition is considered a blot on the history of...