Ven. Antonio Margil of Jesus: Apostle of New Spain

Ven. Antonio Margil of Jesus:
Apostle of New Spain

Marian T. Horvat, Ph.D.
The life of Fr. Antonio Margil of Jesus is an epic story of a man who seems larger than life. Barefoot, carrying only a staff, breviary, and the materials he needed to say Mass, he established hundreds of missions in a territory extending from the jungles of Costa Rica to east Texas and the borders of Louisiana. Countless Indians of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Mexico and Texas received the divine gift of faith from him and revered him a saint. For this, he is called the Apostle of New Spain and Texas. (1)

1. The main works used in this article are, Ubaldus da Rieti, O.F.M., Life of Venerable Fr. Anthony Margil, Taken from the process for his Beatification and Canonization (Quebec/NY: Franciscan Missionary Printing Press, 1910); Eduardo Enrique Rios, Life of Fray Antonio Margil, O.F.M., trans. by Benedict Leutenegger, O.F.M. (Washington D.D.: Academy of American Franciscan History, 1959); Nothingness Itself: Select Writings of Ven Fr. Antonio Margil, O.F.M., (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1976).

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The barefoot friar - famous for his missionary work and miracles

He was also an extraordinarily capable administrator and founded two colleges in Guatemala and Mexico. His name is associated with the epoch of mission colleges, which made possible a rebirth of the Franciscan apostolate, first in Mexico, and later in Guatemala, Panama, and most of South America. In effect, a second golden age for the Franciscans in Spanish America began with the foundation of the colleges, centers established by the Holy Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith to train new missionaries and establish mission churches and settlements.

This “barefoot friar,” famous in his time for his miracles and sanctity, converted hundreds of thousands of Indians. In Guatemala alone, it is recorded that he converted over 80,000 Indians. He became known as the “Flying Father” because he would cover so many miles in such short periods of time it was nothing short of miraculous: it was normal for him to cover 40-50 miles a day over rough terrain, and often more. There are written testimonies of companion brethren and soldiers who saw him, quite literally, walk on water, as he crossed swollen streams and rivers on his apostolic journeys. This capacity to pass from place to place with great speed is known as the gift of agility.

Along his travels, he cured the sick, read souls, prophesied the future. God also granted Fr. Margil the gifts of bilocation, to be present in two places at the same time, and subtility, which enabled him to enter dwellings through closed doors. Like St. Anthony of Padua, he even received marks of veneration from animals. Once when he was directing the building of a missionary College in Guatemala, some Indians arrived with twelve cartloads of stone. Fr. Margil addressed them and blessed them. The Indians knelt and, at the same time, the animals drawing the carts fell to their knees. It is small wonder the fame of this illustrious missionary spread far and wide.

What is more difficult to understand is why Fr. Antonio Margil is not better known today. It is my hope this article will make him better known to the North American Catholics, and that they may begin to invoke the great Apostle of Texas in their needs.

Epoch One: 1657-1684

On August 18, 1657, Antonio Margil was born in Valencia to poor but pious parents, Juan Margil and Speranza Ros. Margil was blessed from childhood with an affable and good nature. Small of stature, the boy had a natural charm, and was attracted to practices of piety and study. Despite their humble means, his parents took care that he should receive the best education possible.

At age 15, Antonio entered the Franciscan novitiate at Corna Monastery in Valencia, and two years later made his first vows. It was there he chose for himself the pseudonym La Misma Nada – Nothingness Itself. He made it his practice from that time on to conclude his letters by writing the words “La Misma Nada” above his name and signature.

After pronouncing final vows, he devoted himself to the study of Philosophy and Theology in the Monastery of Denia and the Royal Monastery of Valencia. During this time, he began the rigid regime he never abandoned his whole life. Every night in the convent garden he performed the pious exercise of the Way of the Cross, carrying a heavy Cross. Afterward, he scourged his body with an iron chain, saying that a religious of St. Francis ought to be fervently devoted to the sufferings of Christ. He practiced a poverty so exact that he often deprived himself of even the necessary things. Amiable with all, he allowed himself no particular friendships, and no shadow of singularity or affectation. It is no surprise that after his death those who had studied with him testified that they had looked upon him as a saint even at this time.

Having completed his studies, he was ordained a priest at age 25. He had asked to remain a friar, like his holy Father Francis, considering himself unworthy of the great privilege of receiving full orders, but his superiors counseled otherwise. The fruits of his preaching and hearing confessions began to appear very soon afterward. Great crowds gathered in the public square of Valencia to listen to him, his words arousing them to tears and repentance. Sometime he spent whole nights in the confessional. Had he remained in Spain, it is no doubt he would have been a renowned preacher and theologian. But Fray Margil was destined for a greater and nobler mission.

To the New World

In 1682, Ven. Fr. Antonio Llinas, Franciscan superior of the American Mission, invited Fr. Margil to be his companion to open the first missionary college in New Spain at Querétaro, Mexico (200 miles north of Mexico City). He immediately consented. Later Fr. Llinas would say that he had brought to America a second St. Anthony of Padua.

With the permission of his superiors, he made a farewell visit to his mother, worthy of mention. She wept bitterly at thought her son was to leave her, and entreated him to consider her advanced age and wait a few years so she might have the consolation of expiring in his arms.

The son did not waver in face of these entreaties. Kindly he reminded her that from the moment she consented he should enter religion, he belonged entirely to God, Who had called him to promote His honor and glory among the pagans. He gave her a Franciscan habit and told her to clothe herself with it and call upon him when death approached.

In fact, shortly after his departure, his mother was stricken with an illness bringing her to the point of death. She did not forget his promise and called on her son. By God’s permission, her son appeared to her, assuring her of recovery, which immediately followed. A few years later when her end in truth approached, Fr. Antonio Margil, by a prodigy of Divine Providence, assisted at her bedside and consoled her in the hour of death in the presence of many persons, even though they were separated by an immense distance.

Epoch Two: 1683-1714 - Apostle of New Spain

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The missionary travels of the barefoot friar extended throughout Central America, Mexico and up to Texas and Louisiana.
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His travels in Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador
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His travels to work the Indians of Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama

Maps from Nothingness Itself: Select Writings of Ven Fr. Antonio Margil, O.F.M., (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1976)
The great odyssey of evangelization began in 1684 when Fr. Margil set out from Santa Cruz College in Querétaro with another Franciscan missionary giant, Fr. Melchor Lopez, who would be his traveling companion for the next ten years. From town to town they traveled, giving missions for a year along the shores of Guatemala. From there, they set out for provinces of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, converting many pagans along the way, and re-catechizing and increasing the fervor of those already Catholic.

Preaching to whomever they met, they walked along, praying in silence or singing. Fr. Margil always walked barefoot, but carried his sandals so he could wear them for Holy Mass out of respect for the Blessed Sacrament. Everywhere he went, he taught his famous Alabado, a song in verse written to catechize the Indians and Spanish children. It is still remembered and sung today in parts of Mexico, Central and South America. Its last verse reads:

“Whoever seeks to follow God and strives to enter in His glory, One thing he must do and say with all his heart: Die rather than sin. Rather than sin, die!”

When they reached a village where they found welcome, they would establish a mission church. The Indians would be taught the catechism, the Rosary, and the Way of the Cross. Other friars would come to replace the first ones and to care for the new Catholics. Before they left, Fr. Margil would plant a wooden cross, as high as he could make it. Then the missionaries would continue onward. Fr. Margil and Fr. Melchor came to be venerated so much that when the priests would leave a village, often the Indians would follow them in crowds of hundreds, carrying branches of trees in their hands, appearing like moving forests from a distance.

Mission among the Talamancas: Miracle worker

From Guatemala, Fr. Margil and Fr. Melchor set out to preach among the Talamanca Indians of Costa Rica. The Talamancas were a mountain dwelling Indian people, actually three nations of Indians famed for their ferocity, human sacrifices, and obstinacy to missionaries.

In particular, the shamans, or witch doctors, put every obstacle in the way to prevent the missionaries from preaching the Gospel of Christ. On one occasion in this region, Fr. Margil was taken prisoner and the shamans instigated the warriors to cast him into a pile of burning wood. The fire was maintained for several hours but the flames did not injure him, even though they blackened the image of the crucifix he held in his hand. On another occasion, Indians of a mountain town poisoned their food, which the missionaries blessed and ate, and came to no harm. Another time they were on the point of being burned at the stake, but the wood refused to burn. Such prodigies increased the fury of the medicine men, but opened the hearts of many of the Indians.

The missionaries suffered these things and more joyfully, their undaunted spirit and great courage earning them the admiration and awe of the Indians. “We suffered what the Lord was pleased to send us,” Fr. Margil later wrote. His only complaint was a sigh of regret not to have gained the crown of martyrdom.

When the Indians realized the utter indifference of the friars toward earthly goods and their great charity toward even those who ill-treated them, they came to trust and love the friars. One of first things Fr. Margil did was successfully petition the government that none of his Talamanca Indians should be taken for work on nearby haciendas, so that the fruit of their missionary labor might not be nullified. In a letter to the president of the Audiencia of Guatemala, Fr. Margil wrote: “Through all this region, called Talamanca, all the tribes say that they will persevere as long as the Spaniards do not come to rule over them; they shall welcome only the priests.”

In the course of two years, he and a single companion, working together and alone, had erected 15 mission churches (some say 30), and baptized hundreds of Indians.

With this success, the pair next decided to go among another unconquered and feared tribe, the Terrabi. Already, the fame of Fr. Antonio Margil was such that when he sent ambassadors to the eight Terrabi chiefs to request permission to enter their territory and preach the Gospel of Christ, seven readily consented.

One, however, refused, declaring before his idols he would slay any missionary who should venture into his territory. The bold response of Fr. Margil unnerved him. Instead of retreating or opening negotiations, Fr. Margil forthright entered his camp, where a war party was being prepared, and went straight to the abode of the chief. Overcome by the sight of this small but intrepid man, shining with a kind of a supernatural light, the chief laid his weapons at Fr. Margil’s feet and received the missionary with demonstrations of affection and honor. This was the effect of the person of Fr. Antonio Margil.

His reputation for discovering false idols was such that in many Indian villages, when word would arrive that Fr. Antonio Margil was coming, they would gather beforehand their false gods for him to burn. They had much experience with the futility of trying to fool the holy friar, who would unearth their idols straight away by a special grace from God. All these idols and charms were then burned in an open place and in the presence of Fr. Margil and Mr. Melchor, who did public penance in reparation to Our Lord for these sins of superstition.

Missions to the Chols and Lacondons

As the name of Fr. Margil and the wonders he performed were on all lips, the Bishop of Guatemala asked that he be sent north to the lands of the Chols, a violent tribe who had rebelled against the efforts of the Dominican missionaries. Their religious instruction proved so fruitful that the greater number of them was converted. Eight towns with churches were established among the Chols.

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Fr. Marhil, shining with supernatural unction, would enter an Indian village with his arm upraised
and holding his crucifix.
Their next mission was along the border of Mexico among the Lacandons. When the missionaries arrived there, even their guides abandoned them, fearful of these naked savages with reputations of being cannibals. Entering their territory, the missionaries were seized, stripped of their habits, bound to trees and commanded under pain of death to worship their idols. They refused, and preached instead the Gospel.

For the three days the men were bound to the posts and tortured, they waited to receive the palm of martyrdom. When the Indians discovered the missionaries were always cheerful and without fear, they believed they concealed something extraordinary in their hearts. At length they released them, on the condition that they leave the place immediately.

Seeing their efforts were of no avail, the missionaries left the place. Before they departed the main village, however, Fr. Margil warned the people that God would punish them shortly with a catastrophe. The prediction was soon verified, for their houses were destroyed by a fire that came from heaven.

Some months later, accompanying a military expedition a road between the Yucatan and Guatemala, Fr. Margil again had opportunity to enter this area. This time, awed by his reputation and won by his kindness, great numbers of the fierce Lacandons came to him, asking to be baptized. Many of the sick here, as in other villages, were healed by the imposition of his hands or the reading of the Gospel of St. John. Of the many miracles performed among the Lacandons, one in particular is worthy of mention.

Among the newly converted, Fr. Margil introduced the pious custom of greeting a person saying “Hail Mary,” which was answered by “Conceived without original sin.” One day Fr. Margil met an Indian woman carrying an infant, still too young to speak. Approaching her in the presence of many persons, he said to the baby: “Hail Mary.” Immediately the infant answered: “Conceived without original sin.” In a marvelous way, the babe attested the singular privilege of the Mother of God, as well as the sanctity of Fr. Antonio Margil.

The soldiers on this expedition witnessed many such marvels. Despite the fact that Fr. Margil always remained far behind the expedition in order to hear confessions and teach catechism to the Lacandons, at the end of the day he arrived at the arranged meeting place ahead of the troops. When the Father Commissary questioned him about how he had passed the men who were traveling on horses, he answered smiling, “I take short cuts and God helps.”

The rumor was also spreading that his feet did not get wet when he crossed the swollen streams and riverbeds. One day a soldier in the expedition pretended he was tired and sleeping on the bank so he could discover how Fr. Margil would cross the turbulent river. Margil noticed the man and understood his intent. He walked over the water and came alongside the soldier. Smiling paternally, he said, “Now that you have seen it, move along.”

The Indians had a simple explanation for such wonders: they called Fr. Margil “santo” and would not desist, even when he reprimanded them. Before he left the Lacandons, Fr. Margil had erected two churches and installed all the pious customs he loved, the Rosary, morning and evening prayers, the Stations, and public processions on feast days.

1697-1714: Founder and administrator

In 1697, Fr. Margil was recalled to Querétaro as superior, or presidente, of the Franciscan College of the Holy Cross, and a new phase of his life began as an administrator. When he reached the College, Fr. Margil took off the ragged habit he had worn and mended for 14 years, patching it at times with bark from a certain tree called the mastastes, and exchanged it for a new one, thus avoiding the least shadow of singularity.

As superior, he never dispensed himself from any public act or expected anything but what he himself practiced. To maintain accuracy and the decorum of ritual, he imposed upon his religious the obligation of holding a conference once a week on the ceremonies of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The friar who loved “Lady Poverty” exhorted his brethren and the faithful to ornament the altars and churches as much as they could so they might be worthy of the divine majesty of God.

His mortifications and gifts

For Our Lord, there was nothing too rich or decorous. For himself, it was a different story. With the exception of Sunday, he fasted every day, taking a few herbs, a piece of bread, and some water or watered down chocolate once a day. He permitted himself sleep only from 8 to 11 every evening. He was wakened then by the brother porter, and together they read a chapter from The Mystical City of God by María de Agreda. After praying the Divine Office at midnight, he made the Stations and scourged himself, and would remain in prayer until the hour of Prime, absorbed in God.

It was clear to all that Heaven smiled on the humble Franciscan. Ecstasies were habitual to Fr. Margil, who was seen raised into the air in his prayer. Fr. Simon de Kierro, a faithful companion for many years, solemnly testified that more than once he had seen him elevated several feet in the air while celebrating Mass.

His confessional was always crowded as persons learned of his rare ability to read souls and discover secret sins. For example, a soldier living in a fort in Texas could not free himself of habits of lust and impurity, and had abandoned himself to a life of vice. One day, hearing Fr. Antonio Margil preach, he desired to have recourse to him, but feared to expose his immoral conduct to a man so pure and holy.

Fr. Margil, inspired by God, called the soldier by name, and encouraged him to make a confession. The soldier made a good confession, lived 40 more years, and attested he had never committed a sin against purity since his confession to Fr. Margil.

His countenance portrayed his virginal purity, shining with the radiance of a burning light. He admitted that in the confessional when penitents entered, he could distinguish those who had been impure, and he was endowed with the rare gift of banishing all impure thoughts and desires from the hearts of those who approached him.

He had the gift of prophecy, especially in reading vocations. At the end of his first visit to the Secretary of War in Guadalajara, Don Juan Martinez de Soria, Fr. Margil asked, “Where is the Little Sister of St. Clare?” Don Juan replied there was none there. Fr. Margil smiled and entering a room where the children were playing, he fixed his gaze on a child, saying, “Behold the little sister of St. Clare.” In fact, the girl became a St. Clare sister, lived a holy and edifying life, and died in the odor of sanctity at age 75.

It was not uncommon for Fr. Margil, upon seeing a boy for the first time, for him to tell the mother or father, “This one belongs to me.” Such prophecies were verified in every case.

Like another Jerimiah, he also often prophesied doom for those who would not heed his words. Once he was preaching in Mexico City, speaking with great zeal against the immoral productions presented in a theater near the church. He warned that God Almighty would soon send down fire to destroy that place where so many sins were committed. That same night, the building was reduced to ashes.

More appointments Seeing the graces and favors bestowed by God upon Fr. Margil and those around him, he was asked to found the College of Christ Crucified at Guatemala, and was elected its first Guardian in 1701. He personally oversaw the construction of the edifice, again working many miracles. Once he ordered a group of children to leave a mortar ditch where they were playing. A few seconds later a pile of dirt fell on it and submerged it. Another time, he bilocated to the work site and stopped a heavy rock from crushing one of the workmen. Astonished by what they saw, the laborers united prayer with their work, substituting the recitation of the Rosary for the normal idle conversation.

As soon as his term as superior ended in 1705, Fr. Margil was appointed commissary of the missions of Costa Rica. Shortly afterward, he was appointed to found another new mission college in Zacatecas, Mexico. In need of financing for this new college, which was in a poor and barren area, he encouraged a benefactor to open a long abandoned silver mine, promising it would yield an abundance of silver. His prophecy proved correct, and the benefactor could defray all the expenses of the building of the College of Our Lady of Guadalupe of Zacatecas, as well as the church and monastery annexed to it.

In November 1713, a new superior of the college was elected, leaving Fr. Margil again free to dedicate himself fully to his missionary labors among the Indians. At an age when many men are dreaming of retirement and relaxation, the almost 60-year-old friar, stooped and worn from a life of hardship and mortification, was ready to embark on the third and last epoch of his life, the founding of missions in Texas.

Ven. Antonio Margil of Jesus, Apostle of New Spain article by Marian Horvat

Ven. Antonio Margil of Jesus:
The Apostle of Texas

Marian T. Horvat, Ph.D.
A quarter century before Fr. Junípero Serra began his California adventure, there was an extraordinary Franciscan carrying out a great work of evangelization across Central America, Mexico, and finally, Texas. In his zeal to spread the Catholic faith, he faced inclement weather, hostile animals, forest insects and reptiles, lack of food and water, and cruel treatment from hostile Indian tribes.

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The barefoot friar who walked on water in his extraordinary missionary work More than once he was tortured, beaten, or left for dead. His name, which deserves to be known and his fame spread is Venerable Antonio Margil de Jesus, who titled himself and signed every letter as El Nada Mismo – Nothingness Itself.

In the United States, we do not have the luxury of a great plenitude of saints. In some Catholic Latin American countries, there are saints for almost every city, accounts of miracles and marvels on every corner, the heavens seem a bit closer to earth. Therefore, when we find a spot where a saint touched the earth here in the United States, we should treasure it and reap the benefits of such gifts from Heaven. This is our Catholic history, these are our real heroes, these are the saints who shared our soil, who Our Lady wants us to develop a relation with, to call on in our needs because she put them in our pathway. One of these marvels is Fr. Antonio Margil.

The postulator for the Cause of Ven Antonio Margil divided his life into three epochs. The first was from 1657, his birth, until his journey to the New World, 1684. The second began with the establishment of the Mission College of Querétaro (Mexico) and his first missions in Guatemala in 1685 until 1716, after he had founded two new colleges in Nicaragua and Mexico. The third and last epoch begins with his Texas missions in the year 1716 , and ends with his death in Mexico City in 1726.

Mission to Texas: 1716-1726

What is most interesting about the Texas missions is that one could say that this was the only assignment Fr. Margil chose himself. All his life, he lived under holy obedience. He wrote that he had “never undertaken any enterprise, not even a step, without permission.” Often poorly considered orders compelled him to leave his missions when the missionaries were on the very brink of reaping the harvest of their preaching and labors. But Fr. Margil never hesitated to abandon enterprises and every hope of success, and travel hundreds of miles through the roughest and most dangerous country, to obey the order of his superiors.

In 1714, however, he had been appointed vice-commissary of the missions of New Spain and had been granted an apostolic faculty to give missions wherever he deemed proper and with those companions who seemed to him best qualified for the accomplishment of this work. He had heard of the plight of the Indians of Texas, ignorant of the true Faith, and living in deplorable and brutish conditions. Now, at almost the age of 60, he was intent upon making the difficult journey there to found missions and convert them.

His five years of work in Texas, only a little over a year in San Antonio, where his name is best remembered, could be itself a lifetime’s work, but it was just a fraction of all he did in his 43 years of work as a missionary in Central and North America. In a certain way, the years in Texas constituted the crown of the glories and sufferings of his lifetime.

Difficult beginnings

Threatened by French encroachments from Louisiana onto Spanish territories, Spain had stepped up its colonization and the Franciscans had established a mission in Texas in 1690. But it had lasted only three years. Because the conditions for colonizers were bleak and difficult, the government was not concerned about its colonization and progress. The friars had to contend with so many difficulties, exorbitant costs, and losses that Fr. Isidro Félix de Espinosa reported in his chronicle, Nuevas Empresas, “The very name of Texas had become odious to the religious.” (1)

1. Eduardo Enrique Rios, Life of Fray Antonio Margil, O.F.M., trans. By Benedict Leutenegger, O.F.M. (Washington D.D.: Academy of American Franciscan History, 1959), p. 57.

Other works used in this article include: Ubaldus da Rieti, O.F.M., Life of Venerable Fr. Anthony Margil, Taken from the process for his Beatification and Canonization (Quebec/NY: Franciscan Missionary Printing Press, 1910); Eduardo Enrique Rios, Life of Fray Antonio Margil, O.F.M., trans. by Benedict Leutenegger, O.F.M. (Washington D.D.: Academy of American Franciscan History, 1959); Nothingness Itself: Select Writings of Ven Fr. Antonio Margil, O.F.M., (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1976).

Fr. Margil faced a first major obstacle standing in the way of an expedition. A presidio, or military post, had to be established at the entrance to the provinces to afford escorts to the missionaries and render assistance in case of uprisings or attacks. Funds were needed for this purpose, and the royal treasury was exhausted from wars. As usual, Fr. Margil relied on Providence, which supplied in a remarkable way.

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The heavy dotted lines indicate the primary route of Fr. Margil. Because of his reputation and popularity among the soldiers, each member of the garrison voluntarily offered him out of his pay $25 a year for life, and with this money he financed the presidio of St. John the Baptist on the Rio Grande. The way to Texas was opened.

At the beginning of 1716, an expedition party of 25 soldiers with their families set out set out for the 2,000 mile trek from Nicaragua to Texas. They were accompanied by friars from the Colleges of Querétaro and Zacatecas. Fr. Margil led the party from the Zacatecas College, and Fr. Espinosa was appointed head of the Querétaro College missionaries. Each of the colleges was to establish three missions.

As with many ventures God desires to bless, the beginnings were difficult, and for a while it seemed Fr. Margil would not even make it to Texas. Weary from the labor of the preparations, he took a fever at the very onset of the expedition and could hardly walk. When they reached the Rio Grande, he barely managed to cross, and received the Last Sacraments. The rest of the missionary party, mourning, left him to die with only a lay brother to attend him so that they could continue on with the soldiers, who could wait no longer.

But Fr. Margil did not die. He slowly recovered, and in June set out to regain the party. By the time he rejoined them in July, the first of the Zacatecas missions, the Mission of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Nacogdoches, Texas, had been founded.

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The stream at the crossing of Lanana Creek, Louisiana In 1717, Fr. Margil established the second, Mission San Miguel, near present-day Robeline. Thus he had the honor to erect the first church building in what is now the State of Louisiana. Shortly afterward, he also established Mission Nuestra Señora de los Dolores near San Augustine, Texas, halfway between the two, and resided there.

A memorial to one of the miracles he performed during this time still exists at a crossing of Lanana Creek. During a journey from Nacogdoches to an outlying village, his group was exhausted and faint with thirst, with no hope of finding water.

Fr. Margil addressed his companions:

“Fear not, do not be dismayed. Trust in God, for in a short time you shall have water.”

Then striking a rock in the dry creek bed twice with his staff, fresh and clear water gushed forth and continues to flow to this day. The place was named the Little Eyes of Fr. Antonio Margil.

More troubles and false promises

The most testing problems the missionaries faced in Texas were not the difficult terrain or savage character of the inhabitants. First and most trying, they had to contend with the false promises and treachery of the Spanish captains, who enriched themselves in Texas while the missions suffered from lack of the most basic food and supplies. Second, they faced the French soldiers, who were vying with the Spanish for control of the territory.

In fact, with the Texas Indians, the simple weapon Fr. Margil employed was kindness. On every occasion and for every need, he was at hand. He ploughed and sowed their gardens, procured fruits, nuts and other products for their enjoyment, relieved their fatigue by doing their work. He liberally gave his services to obtain his end, to harvest a great wealth of souls.

Nonetheless, having won the Indians of that area to hear the preaching of the true Faith, he felt all the more keenly how crucial the provisions were to sustain the missions. But the promised help did not come. In a report of the missions to the Mexican Viceroy in February 1718, he wrote: “All this will perish if help does not come immediately.”

Two years passed without receiving help from any source. Failed crops worsened the situation. There were always promises of help from the Texas governor, but nothing ever came. Finally, the six missionaries met and decided to send two of their members to make a report of the actual situation. In fact, Fr. Mattias spent three months in Mexico City, but could not succeed in making the authorities understand the urgent need for soldiers and supplies to sustain the Spanish Texas settlements, especially in the northeastern missions of Fr. Margil where the French were already building forts and trading guns for horses to gain the good will of the Indians.

To make matters worse, in 1719, France declared war on Spain. As soon as the French garrisons in Louisiana learned of this, they attacked Mission San Miguel in Robeline. Fr. Margil was forced to abandon his missions and withdraw to the Mission of the Immaculate Conception, one of the three missions of the Querétaro College that had been established around San Antonio. Finally, it was also abandoned for the more secure Mission of San Antonio de Valero, better known today as the Alamo, founded in 1718 by Fr. Isidro Félix de Espinosa.

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Above, The Mission of San Antonio de Valero, better known as El Alamo

Below, Mission of San Jose founded by Fr. Margil in 1720
http://www.traditioninaction.org/Mar...l_Mission1.jpg Fr. Margil and his small band were at the Alamo mission from December 1719 to March of 1721. He took advantage of the time to write a dictionary of the various dialects spoken by the Indians of this vast territory. And he founded on the banks of the San Antonio River the Mission of San Jose, which prospered and came to be the most beautiful mission of Texas, the “Queen of the Texas Missions,” as it is called today.

He never gave up hope of recovery of his lost missions, first, as he wrote, “for God and for love of souls,” and second, “so that they may not say it was lost because of us or that it was not recovered by us.” The opportunity came in April 1721, when large expeditionary forces of a new governor arrived. Fr. Margil had the pleasure of seeing those missions restored one by one. He had already founded another mission dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe of the Bay and was intending to go further when news arrived in 1722 from the College of Zacatecas that he had been elected again as Superior for a three year term.

He had found delight in the silence and broad expanse of the land, and had written in his letters to his brethren missionaries that he hoped to die here, a simple friar, small and forgotten among his Indians of Texas. Instead, he set out on the long return trek to again take up the burden of superior in Zacatecas.

His death and miracles

Five months after Fr. Margil left Texas, he conducted a great mission in Zacatecas that was an enormous success. The Bishop took advantage of the marvelous good effected by his words and example, and sent him to Guadalajara to ease a dissension that was disturbing its citizens, and then on to several other places of his Diocese. Fatigued and infirm, Fr. Margil obeyed.

Truly it was a remarkable sight to see this saint still traveling barefoot, not so fleet of foot anymore, humble, worn and old, but shining every day more with a supernatural sheen, burning with zeal for souls. The people would go in procession to meet him as he entered a city, some traveling great distances, scattering branches of palms and flowers along the way.

When he reached Querétaro, he was so weak and emaciated it was obvious that death was near. As he traversed the streets of that city where he had done so much good, the people saw he would not be with them much longer and they cut pieces from his mantle to preserve them as holy relics. The Commissary General, fearing proper treatment was not available for him there, ordered him to go to Mexico City where he would have the advantages of an infirmary and the best medical attention.

Fr. Margil obeyed and set out on his last journey, a hundred miles he knew would shorten, not lengthen, his earthly days. On August 2nd, 1726, he arrived at Santa Cruz College and went to ask the blessing of the superior. “Rev. Father Superior,” he said, “the donkey has come here to deposit its burden.”

His illness lasted five days, but he never complained of sufferings or asked the least relief, although he suffered greatly. When sickness brought delirium, he was heard preaching, singing hymns, invoking the holy names of Jesus and Mary, reprimanding sinners with kindness and charity, and reciting the Rosary.

On August 5, when a picture of Our Lady of Remedies was brought to him, Fr. Margil greeted her with tender affection, and ended, “Hasta manana, my dearly beloved Lady, until tomorrow.” To keep his promise, the next day, the feast of the Transfiguration, his soul peacefully went to God between 1 and 2 o’clock in the afternoon. He died just 12 days short of his 69th year, having spent 53 years in the Franciscan Order and 43 years as a missionary in North and Central America.

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Our Lady of the Remedies, Patroness of Valencia (Spain) When notice of his death was given, all the bells of the Mexico City began to ring announcing it. Citizens of all ages and conditions lined up to see the mortal remains of the Servant of God, exposed for three days in the Franciscan church and surrounded by guards to protect it from the multitudes. His face, pallid in life, had now assumed a rosy hue, his limbs remained flexible, his flesh warm. His feet, worn to leather and covered with rough calluses from the thousands of miles he had trod, became soft and supple like those of a child.

Even in death Fr. Antonio Margil continued to do good for souls. An artist of Mexico City who was contracted to make his portrait could not reproduce the countenance despite his efforts. Finally, the artist examined his conscience and found a serious sin he had never confessed. He made his confession to one of the fathers, received absolution, and was able to finish the portrait with the greatest ease.

Shortly after his death the process for beatification was begun. But because of grave political situation in Europe, the process was interrupted and only in 1836 was he declared Venerable by Pope Gregory XVI. The Franciscan martyrology commemorates Fr. Margil on August 6, the day of his death.

Why he is not a saint yet? In 1992 the archivist of the Vatican Congregation for Causes of Saints Fr. Jarslav Nemec and the Franciscan promoter of the cause, Fr. Juan Foquera, stated as soon as there is an approved miracle attributed to the intercession of Fr. Margil, he will be beatified, and then after a second miracle, he will be canonized. Miracles can be reported to The Margil House of Studies, in Houston, Tx

The grandeur of God is revealed in His saints

Before he died in Mexico City, he insisted on making a general confession, which was very short, since the faults of his lifetime were so slight that the confessor had difficulty finding sufficient matter to give him absolution. Seeing the surprise of the priest and fearing he would attribute the merit to him for such rare, spotless purity, Fr. Margil said:

“If Your Reverence should see a ball of gold suspended by a hair, though gold is very heavy, would you think that it was supported by itself? Now, I have been a poor creature, liable to fall at any moment, and if God had not kept his omnipotent hand over me, I do not know what I might have done.”

This conviction that all the good that came from him was due to God, and not himself, formed the foundation for the heroic humility he practiced.

The confessor also reported that he had questioned Fr. Margil about his experiences while saying Mass. With the greatest possible humility, he wrote, Fr. Margil told him a singular favor that he was wont to receive during Mass. After he spoke the words of the Consecration, Christ would seem to respond from the consecrated Host, using the same words of Consecration and alluding to the body of Fr. Margil, ‘Hoc est Corpus meum.’ This favor Fr. Margil attributed to the fact that he always had or tried to have Christ living within him.

Conclusion

The missionary efforts of Fr. Margil could be called diametrically opposed to the ecumenism introduced by Vatican II. With his burning zeal to bring all people to the Catholic faith, Fr. Margil would have been confounded by the meeting at Assisi, where Catholics met on an equal level with American Indian medicine men and African animists. For him, the Catholic Religion was the supreme value of life, the one truth all should profess. The false gods must be combated, the idols and superstitious charms burned.

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The Missionaries converted the Indians and ordered all things to Catholic truth and morals. He understood that all the values of life are good to the measure that they serve the Catholic Church. So among the people he set out to evangelize, his first objective was to order everything to the Catholic faith. The customs, habits, ways of being that already existed among those people were good only in so much as they were ordered to the Catholic truth and morals. Those that were not ordered in this sense had to be put aside. This is the complete subjection of all things to the Catholic Religion, which is demanded by a truly saintly soul.

It is an honor to describe a little of the life of this extraordinary and saintly man, Fr. Antonio Margil. It is not by chance that part of the land he evangelized today is the United States, and especially Texas. Nothing happens by chance with Divine Providence.

What, then, is its significance? I leave the answer for each of my readers to discover. One thing is certain, from his place in Heaven, he is watching us, and he wants to help us to continue on or return to the true Catholic Faith, as he did with hundreds of thousands Indians in the New World. With this conviction I invite you to begin to pray to the glorious Ven. Antonio Margil de Jesus.

Ven. Antonio Margil de Jesus - Apostle of Texas article by Marian Horvat