Martin de Porres
Saint Martín de Porres Velázquez (Lima, December 9, 1579-Lima, November 3, 1639), secular name Juan Martín de Porres Velázquez, was a friar born in the viceroyalty of Peru, of the Dominican order. He was the first mulatto saint of America, he is also known as the saint of the broom for being represented with a broom in his hand as a symbol of his humility.
Biography
Childhood
Martín de Porres or Porras was the son of a nobleman from Burgos, a knight of the Order of Alcántara, Juan de Porras de Miranda, a native of the city of Burgos, and a black woman, Ana Velázquez, a native of Panama who resided in Lima.
His father could not marry a woman of his condition, because he was very poor, which did not prevent his cohabitation with Ana Velázquez. As a result of this relationship, Martín was born and, two years later, Juana de Porres Velázquez, his only sister. Martín de Porres was baptized on December 9, 1579 in the Church of San Sebastián in Lima.
Ana Velázquez gave careful Christian education to her two sons. Juan de Porres was stationed in Guayaquil, and from there he provided them with sustenance. Seeing the precarious situation in which they were growing up, without a father or teachers, she decided to recognize them as her children before the law. In her childhood and early adolescence, she suffered from the poverty and limitations of the black community in which she lived.
Religious Life
He trained as a practical assistant, empirical doctor, barber and herbalist. In 1594, at the age of fifteen, and at the invitation of Fray Juan de Lorenzana, a famous Dominican, theologian and man of virtues, he entered the Order of Santo Domingo de Guzmán under the category of "donated", that is, as a tertiary for being an illegitimate child (he received accommodation and was engaged in many jobs as a servant). Thus he lived nine years, practicing the most humble trades. He was admitted as a brother of the order in 1603. He persevered in his vocation despite the opposition of his father, and in 1606 he became a friar professing the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
Of all the virtues that Martín de Porres possessed, humility stood out, he always put others before his own needs. On one occasion, the Convent had serious financial difficulties and the Prior found himself in need of selling some valuable objects. Given this, Martín de Porres offered to be sold as a slave to help remedy the crisis. The Prior, moved, refused his help.. He constantly exercised his pastoral and missionary vocation; He taught the Christian doctrine and faith of Jesus Christ to the blacks and Indians and rustic people who attended to listen to him in the streets and on the farms near the properties of the Order located in Limatambo.
The situation of poverty and moral abandonment that they suffered worried him; Thus, with the help of several wealthy people from the city —among them the viceroy Luis Jerónimo Fernández de Cabrera y Bobadilla, IV Count of Chinchón, who handed him no less than one hundred pesos each month— he founded the Asylum and School of Santa Cruz to gather all the lazy, orphans and beggars, and help them out of their pitiful situation.
Martín always aspired to carry out a missionary vocation in distant countries and provinces. They frequently heard him speak of the Philippines, China and especially Japan, a country that he once said he knew. The future saint was frugal, abstinent and a vegetarian. He only slept for two or three hours, mostly in the afternoon. He always wore a simple white cordellate habit with a long black cape. Once when the prior forced him to receive a new habit and another friar congratulated him with a smile, Martín replied: "Well, with this they will bury me" and, indeed, it was.
Ideal of holiness
Martín was a follower of the models of holiness of Saint Dominic de Guzmán, Saint Joseph, Saint Catherine of Siena and Saint Vicente Ferrer. However, despite his fiery fervor and devotion, he did not develop a line of mysticism of his own.
Martín de Porres was a confidant of Saint Juan Macías, a Dominican friar, with whom he forged a close friendship. It is known that he also met Saint Rose of Lima, a Dominican tertiary, and that they met a few times, but there are no historically proven details of these interviews.
Martín's charismatic personality made him sought out by people from all social strata, high dignitaries of the Church and the Government, simple people, rich and poor, all found in Martín relief for their spiritual, physical or material needs. His entire disposition and his unconditional help to his neighbor led him to be seen as a holy man.
Although he tried to hide, his fame as a saint grew day by day. There were several families in Lima that received help from Martín de Porres in one way or another. Also, many sick people, the first thing they asked for when they felt serious was: "Let the holy brother Martin come." And he never refused a favor to whom he could do it.
His death
Almost at the age of sixty, Martín de Porres fell ill and announced that the time had come to meet the Lord. The news caused deep commotion in the city of Lima. Such was the veneration for this mulatto that Viceroy Luis Jerónimo Fernández de Cabrera y Bobadilla went to kiss his hand when he was on his deathbed, asking him to watch over him from Heaven.
Martín asked the religious mourners to sing the creed out loud and while they were doing so, he died. It was 9:00 p.m. m. on November 3, 1639 in Ciudad de los Reyes, capital of the Viceroyalty of Peru. The whole city gave him its last goodbye in a massive way where people from all social classes mixed. High civil and ecclesiastical authorities carried him on their shoulders to the crypt, tolled the bells in his name and popular devotion was so excessive that the authorities were forced to carry out a quick burial.
Currently his remains rest in the Basilica and Convent of Santo Domingo, in Lima, along with the remains of Saint Rose of Lima and Saint Juan Macías in the so-called Altar of the Saints of Peru.
Attributed miracles
The stories of the miracles attributed to her intercession are many and surprising, these were collected as sworn testimonies in the diocesan (1660-1664) and apostolic (1679-1686) Processes, opened to promote her beatification. A good part of these testimonies come from the same Dominican religious who lived with him, but there are also many other people, since Martín de Porres dealt with people from all social classes.
He is credited with the gift of bilocation. Without leaving Lima, it is said that he was seen in Mexico, Africa, China and Japan, encouraging missionaries who were in difficulty or healing the sick. While he remained locked in his cell, they saw him arrive next to the bed of certain dying people to comfort or heal them. Many saw him go in and out of rooms with the doors closed. On occasions he would leave the convent to attend to a seriously ill person, and he would later re-enter without having a key to the door and without anyone opening it. Asked how he did it, he replied: "I have my ways of entering and leaving."
He was considered to have control over nature, the plants he sowed germinated before their time and all kinds of animals obeyed his commands. One of the best known episodes of his life is that he made a dog, a mouse and a cat eat from the same plate in complete harmony. He was also attributed the gift of healing, of which many testimonies remain, the most extraordinary being the healing of terminally ill patients. "I heal you, God heals you" was the phrase he used to say to avoid showing veneration for his person.
According to the testimonies of the time, sometimes they were instantaneous cures, in others their presence alone was enough for the terminally ill to begin a surprising and firm recovery process. Normally the remedies arranged by him were the ones indicated for the case, but on other occasions, when he did not have them, he resorted to unlikely means with the same results. With some bandages and lukewarm wine he healed a child who had broken both legs, or by applying a piece of shoe sole to a shoemaker's arm to heal it of a serious infection.
Many testimonials stated that when he prayed with great devotion, he levitated and did not see or hear people. Sometimes the same viceroy who was going to consult him (even though Martín had few studies) had to wait a long time at the door of his room, waiting for his ecstasy to end. Another of the faculties attributed to him was clairvoyance. He used to appear before the poor and sick bringing them certain food, medicines or objects that they had not requested but that were secretly desired or needed by them.
It was also told, among other facts, that Juana, her sister, having secretly stolen a sum of money from her husband, met Martín, who immediately called her attention for what he had done. He was also credited with powers to predict his own life and that of others, including the moment of death.
From the stories that are kept of his miracles, it seems to be deduced that Martín de Porres did not give them much importance. Sometimes, even when imposing silence about them, he used to do it with jovial jokes, full of grace and humility. In the life of Martín de Porres, miracles seemed natural works. It is said that at some moments in his life, he had to deal with the devil; especially on the day of his death, where presumably the devil ended up being defeated.
Beatification and canonization
In 1660, the Archbishop of Lima, Pedro de Villagómez, began collecting declarations of the virtues and miracles of Martín de Porres to promote his beatification, but despite his exemplary biography and having become a fundamental devotion of mulattoes, Indians and blacks, the colonial society did not take him to the altars. Although in 1763 Pope Clement XIII issued a decree affirming the heroism of his virtues, his beatification process lasted until 1837, when he was beatified by Pope Gregory XVI in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore.
Pope John XXIII, who felt a true devotion to Martín de Porres, canonized him in Vatican City on May 6, 1962 before a crowd of 40,000 people from various parts of the world, naming him Patron Saint of Social Justice, extolling his virtues in his canonization homily:
«St. Martin, always obedient and inspired by his divine Master, lived among his brothers with that deep love that is born of pure faith and humility of heart. He loved men because he saw them as children of God and as his own brothers and sisters. Such was his humility that loved them more than himself, and that he considered them better and more virtuous than he... Martin excused someone else's faults. He forgave the bitterest insults, convinced that he deserved greater punishment for his sins. He tried to encourage those who were accompanied by their own faults, comforted the sick, provided clothing, food and medicine to the poor, helped peasants, blacks and mulattos who were then slaves. People call him Martin, the good one."
The proclamation of Martín de Porres as a saint was supported by the miraculous healings that occurred to a seriously ill elderly woman in Asunción (Paraguay) in 1948 and to a child with a leg about to be amputated due to gangrene, in Tenerife (Spain) in 1956. In Peru, which had carried out an intense campaign a few years before to publicize his life and promote his canonization, there were many festivities. The then President of the Republic, Manuel Prado y Ugarteche, promulgated Supreme Decree No. 61-C (March 26, 1962) a few months earlier, by which 1962 was named the “Year of Fray Martín de Porres”, thus perpetuating the date of canonization of the Holy Mulatto. In addition, a commission was formed that urgently and immediately organized the activities to celebrate the great event. This commission was chaired by Dr. Geraldo Arosemena Garland, Minister of Justice and Worship.
On the day of the canonization, the city of Lima was flagged by all the residents, as a sign of Peruvian identity. In addition, at noon all the church bells rang, an act that was carried out nationwide. The flagship of the Peruvian navy, Crucero Almirante Grau, carried out a 21-gun salute in Callao Bay, while all the units of the Peruvian squadron sounded their sirens. Finally, the relics of San Martín de Porres were exhibited in the Church of Santo Domingo until June 3, which allowed them to be venerated by thousands of faithful.
In 1966 Pope Paul VI proclaimed him patron saint of barbers and hairdressers and, in Peru, of social justice. His festivity in the Catholic saints is celebrated on November 3, the date of his death. In various cities of Peru, patron saint festivities are held in his name and processions of his image that day, the main procession being the one that departs from the Church of Santo Domingo, in Lima, the place where his mortal remains rest.
Worship in the United States
During the XX century, the cult of Fray Martín de Porres gained great importance among the black population of the United States. Catholics of African and enslaved descent identified him as a person who demonstrated the universality of the Catholic Church, and promoted worship among their own communities. As Gustave B. Aldrich commented in 1930 in The Chronicle magazine >, of the Federated Colored Catholics, "The representation of black saints and great men of faith in our Colored Catholic churches will do much to rehabilitate our self-respect."
Martín de Porres in film and television
- The first film about St. Martin's life was Fray Escoba, 1961 Spanish film, by director Ramón Torrado and starring René Muñoz.
- Also Valentine Pimstein produced in 1964, in Mexico, the soap opera San Martín de Porresrepeating Rene Muñoz, the role of the holy mulatto.
- In 1968, the soap opera took place in Brazil O Santo Mestiçoinspired by the life of Fray Martin, and interpreted by Sérgio Cardoso.
- In 1974, again René Muñoz reincarnated the limeño saint in the Mexican-Peruvian film. A Mulato named Martindirected by Tito Davison.
- In 1972, in Argentina, the soap opera Heaven is for allrecreating the life of the saint. In Mexico they adapted the same story and produced the soap opera with the same name: Heaven is for allin 1979, taking for the last time René Muñoz in the role of Fray Martin de Porres.
- In 2006, Raimundo Calixto led actor Pedro Telémaco, in Fray Martín de Porres, TV movie.
- In 2016, Peruvian production was premiered Fray Martin's micestarring actor Miguel Carty.
- Chapter "San Martín de Porres" of the series Test of Faith (2016).
Filmography
- 1961 - Fray Escoba (Spain)
- 1963 - Miracles of St Martin de Porres (Mexico)
- 1974 - A mulato called Martin/San Martín de Porres (Mexico, Peru)
TV movies
- 2006 - Fray Martin de Porres
- 2016 - Fray Martin's mice (Peru)
- 2017 - San Martín de Porres (EWTN)
Soap operas
- 1964 - San Martín de Porres (Mexico)
- 1968 - O Santo Mestiço (Brazil)
- 1972 - Heaven is for all (Argentina)
- 1979 - Heaven is for all (Mexico)
Sponsorships
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