Feast Of St. Joseph Vaz 2019 (1651 - 1711)

Joseph Vaz, CO, (Konkani: Sant Zuze Vaz; Portuguese: São José Vaz; The third of six children, Vaz was born in 1651 at Benaulim, his mother's village in Goa, then known as Portuguese India, part of the Portuguese Empire.[2] His parents, Cristóvão Vaz and Maria de Miranda, were devout Catholics.[3] Cristóvão belonged to a prominent Naik family of Sancoale.[4] He was baptised on the eighth day at the Parish Church of St. John the Baptist, Benaulim by its pastor, Jacinto Pereira. Vaz attended the elementary school in Sancoale. He learned Portuguese in Sancoale and Latin in Benaulim. He was a bright pupil and respected by his teachers and fellow students.[2] He made such rapid progress in his studies that his father decided to send him to the city of Goa for further studies; where he did a course in rhetoric and humanities at the Jesuit college of St. Paul. He further studied philosophy and theology at the St. Thomas Aquinas' Academy of the Dominicans, in Goa city.[2] In 1675, Vaz was ordained a deacon for the Archdiocese of Goa by Custódio de Pinho, the Vicar Apostolic of Bijapur and Golconda.[2] In 1676, he was ordained a priest by the Archbishop of Goa, António Brandão, S.O.Cist. Soon after his ordination, he started going barefoot to live like the poor and acquired a reputation as a popular preacher and confessor. He opened a Latin school in Sancoale for prospective seminarians. In 1677 he consecrated himself as a "slave of Mary", sealing it with a document known as the "Deed of Bondage".[2] Read in detail at Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Vaz