Luis Sotelo
Luis Sotelo (
1574-
1624), was a
Franciscan friar born in
Sevilla,
Spain on
September 6,
1574. He died as a
martyr in Japan in
1624, and was
beatified by
Pope Pius IX in
1867.
Sotelo studied at the
University of Salamanca before entering the convent of "Calvario de los Hermanos Menores". He was sent in 1600 to the
Philippines, in order to take on the spiritual needs of the Japanese settlement of
Dilao, until it was destroyed by Spanish forces in
1608 after intense fighting.
In 1608
Pope Paul V authorized minor orders (Dominicans and Franciscans) to proselytize in Japan, heretofore the preserve of the
Jesuits. Sotelo immediately went to Japan and took a leading role there.
Sotelo then went to Japan where he tried to establish a Franciscan church in the area of
Tokyo. The church was destroyed in
1612 following the interdiction of
Christianity in the territories of the
Tokugawa shogunate on April 21, 1612 (the prohition edicts were a reaction to a bribery scandal between a close collaborator of the Shogun, Okamoto Daihachi, and the Christian
daimyo Arima Harunobu).
Sotelo fled to the northern part of Japan, in the area controlled by the
Daimyo of
Sendai,
Date Masamune, under whom Christianity was still tolerated. He came back to Tokyo the following year and constructed and inaugurated a new church on May 12, 1613, in the area of
Asakusa Torigoe. The Bakufu reacted by arresting Christian, and Sotelo himself was put in the Kodenma-Cho (小伝馬") prison. Seven fellow Japanese Christian who had been arrested with Sotelo were executed on July 1st, but Sotelo was freed following a special request by Date Masamune.
Sotelo projected and accompanied a Japanese embassy sent by Date Masamune to Spain in 1613. The embassy was headed by
Hasekura Tsunenaga, and crossed the Pacific onboard the Japanese-built galleon
San Juan Bautista. He had the Japanese receive
baptism in
Madrid, before accompanying them to see
Pope Paul V in
Rome.
The embassy was a product of political ambitions of Sotelo and Date Masamune. Sotelo tried to establish a diocese on Northern Japan that was to be independent from the
Jesuits-controlled diocese of Funai (
Nagasaki). His campaign was obstructed by the Portuguese and even failed to gain wide support from the Franciscans because it was linked with his personal ambition for the bishop's post. Date Masamune wanted to trade with
Nueva España (
Mexico) but it became soon apparent that the trade was too costly.
Sotelo accompanied the Japanese embassy back to the
Philippines in
1618, where he remained for some time, because Christianity was being harshly repressed in Japan. He got into a jam in church as he had oversold his achievement in Japan. The Catholic Council of the Indies sent him back to Nueva España in 1620 to pursue his missionary activities there.
Sotelo finally managed to infiltrate Japan in 1622 on-board a Chinese junk, whence he was discovered and imprisoned. After two years in prison, Luis Sotelo was
burnt alive, together with two Franciscans, a Jesuit and a Dominican, at the age of 50.
He was
beatified by
Pope Pius IX in
1867.
*"The Christian century in Japan 1549-1650" C.R. Boxer ISBN 1857540352
