Ole Bernardinho, Regretfully I must say that I did not find anything new in the snippet that you found interesting. In my translation of Shenoy Goembab's "The Triumph of Konkani" at page 17-18, you will find the following: "When a Brahmin was converted, the joy of the priest was akin to that of a father at the birth of his first son. The Portuguese celebrations, which followed the conversions of Lakhu Brahmin by the Jesuit priest Gaspar Barzeu in 1548, were befitting a Maharaja or a Viceroy of today. Barzeu babtized Lakhu, his wife and grandson, all at the same time in St. Paul's church with great fanfare. On that occasion, the Governor himself stood as Lakhu's godfather. In order to ensure that a minimal change would occur in Lakhu's Konkani name, he was called Lucas. After the christening, he was taken in a procession around town astride a beautiful caparisoned Arabian horse. His route was decorated with twigs of trees, white tender shoots of coconut palms, and silk cloth. On the way, he was saluted by Portuguese nobles amidst shouts of 'viva'. There were cannonades and pealing of church bells all around. This celebration went on for full eight days."
The reference cited for this is: Oriente conquistado a Jesu Christo, Lisboa, tomo 1, conquista 1, div. 1, para 43. It is more likely that Lucas changed his religion not because he found the Christian doctrine better than his native one, but in order to save his lucrative job of tax collector. The shrewd Saraswats are reported to have hit upon an ingenious method of making the best of a bad bargain, a method which ensured that "heads I win, tails you lose." Half the brothers would embrace Christianity and stay on to look after their properties in Goa and the other half would migrate with their gods. This opportunistic 'conversion' is perhaps at the very root of the survival of caste discrimination among Goan Catholics. In many ways, it was encouraged by the Church too! Sebastian Borges On 24 Apr 2010 Bernado Colaco <[email protected]> wrote: Referring to Lucas you are probably right or wrong and I am wrong or right. I found the historical snippet interesting and posted it on GN since so much Goan history is discussed in all forms nowadays without mentioning the first Goan Catholic. ? BC
