Om· Catholic Heritage in Texas
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in summer as the hour most convenient for both the soldiers and the settlers. The chaplain of the garrison should be instructed to follow this suggestion with all regularity. Furthermore it was customary to ring the bells three times at intervals before the hour at which the Mass was to begin. He advised that this be done, beginning fifteen minutes before the hour and twice thereafter at five-minute intervals. He reminded Elguezabal that local commanders had no authority to change the time of Mass, except on the eve of setting out on a campaign. 73 A Capuchin friar by the name of Buena- ventura de Castro appears to have fled from New Orleans and taken refuge in Texas early in 1800, probably because of his sympathies for the French Revolution. Captain Jose Miguel del Moral, commander at Nacogdoches, informed Elguezabal that it had come to his notice that the fugitive friar had been harbored in Nacogdoches by Father Vallejo. Castro evidently did not stay long, because he is next heard of from Monterrey, where Miguel Ignacio de Zarate, the vicar of the vacant diocese, was requested by the bishop of Louisiana to make a diligent search for the fugitive. Zarate wrote Elguezabal that, according to the information he had received, Fray Castro was a fugitive from justice, that he had gone first to Nacogdoches, thence to San Antonio, and was now probably in that city living incognito. Del Moral had stated that Castro claimed to have been the curate of Galveston. Governor Elguezabal was asked to arrest him and send him back to New Orleans. There seems to be no indication that he was ever apprehended. 74 Religious political refugee. Aid for canonization of San Felipe de Jesi,s. Commandant General Nava informed Governor Munoz in January, 1798, that he had granted permission for a collection to be taken up by the parish priests in all the towns and settlements of the Interior Provinces for the canonization of San Felipe de Jesus. 15 The archbishop of Mexico had undertaken to promote the canonization of this saintly missionary, the first native- born Mexican to suffer marytrdom. He was crucified on February 5. 1597, ,vith twenty-sfx Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries in Nangazaque, Japan.1 6 1lPedro Nava to Juan Bautista Elguezabal, July Io, 1800. Bezar Archives. 74 Jose Miguel de! Moral to Elguezabal, April 26, 1800; Miguel Ignacio de Zarate to Elguezabal, October 12, 1801. Bexar Archives.
15 Nava to Munoz, January 31, 1798. Bezar Archives. 16 Pichardo, Vida de San Felipe de Jesus, 454-471.
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