Eusebio Francisco cinema

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Oil painting by Eusebio Francisco Kino, around 1700.

Eusebio Francisco Kino , actually Eusebio Francesco Chini or Eusebius Franz Kühn (born August 10, 1645 in Segno, which is now part of the municipality of Predaia ( Trentino ); † March 15, 1711 in Magdalena de Kino in the state of Sonora , Mexico ) was a Tyrolean Jesuit , who worked as a missionary , astronomer and cartographer in an area that is now in northwestern Mexico and the southwestern United States .

Life

In Europe

Eusebius Franz Kühn grew up in simple circumstances. Sent to a Jesuit school in Trento by his parents Franz Kühn and Margherita Luchi, he learned to read and write there. He received his further training in a Jesuit college in Hall in Tirol , then in Ingolstadt . In Landsberg am Lech he joined the Jesuits in 1665. He was particularly interested in mathematics and the natural sciences.

After completing his theological studies, he turned down the offer of the Bavarian Elector for an apprenticeship at the University of Ingolstadt in order to work as a missionary in the Orient. By chance he was called to Mexico instead of China. He was sent to Spain in 1678 to study the Spanish language . From there he embarked in 1681 with 18 companions for Veracruz in New Spain , part of the Spanish colonial empire in Central America, which today includes parts of the United States and Mexico .

In America

During an expedition that he soon embarked on, he saw the cruel reality of colonizing Baja California . Through an agreement between the Spanish Crown and the Jesuits, the latter became solely responsible for California. On this expedition he made the important discovery that Baja California is not an island, as previously assumed, but a peninsula. In Baja California he was entrusted with the missionary work of the Seris and Guaymas .

Later his real work began from Loreto . Within a short period of time, several missions were set up under the direction of Kino. The good communication with the Indians and also those within the Indian tribes, who often had armed conflicts with one another, was a big concern of the cinema. He had contact with several tribes and was visited by tribal chiefs who trusted him; he also learned the language of the Pima Indians. Kino tried to improve the economic and hygienic situation of the Indians and pushed cattle breeding, and he had them taught how to handle iron. He was the first to produce maps of the area that corresponds to today's southwestern United States. The Indian-friendly attitude of cinemas was not welcomed by some of his friars. The Indians called him the Black Peasant because of his habit .

Cinema's area of ​​interest also included astronomy. He was in contact with the Mexican nun, scholar and poet Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, who dedicated a sonnet to him on the occasion of a work he wrote on the comet of 1680 (later known as Kirch'scher Komet). The font was created between 1680 and 1681 and was published under the title Exposición astronómica de el cometa .

List of important mission establishments

Mission station “La Purísima Concepción” in Caborca
  • La Misión de Nuestra Señora de los Dolores (1687) ( Sonora )
  • La Misión de Nuestra Señora de los Remedios (1699) (Sonora)
  • La Misión de Nuestra Señora del Pilar y Santiago de Cocóspera (Sonora)
  • La Misión de San Ignacio de Cabórica (Sonora)
  • La Misión de San Pedro y San Pablo de Tubutama (Sonora)
  • La Misión de La Purísima Concepción de Nuestra Señora de Caborca (Sonora)
  • La Misión de San Diego del Pitiquí ( Pitiquito ) (Sonora)
  • La Misión de San Cayetano de Tumacácori ( Arizona )
  • Las Misiones del Alto Santa Cruz (Smaller missions scattered between Sonora and Arizona)
  • Las Visitas del Río Altar (Sonora)
  • La Misión de San Xavier del Bac (Arizona)

Works

  • Exposición astronómica del cometa

Adoration

Bronze by Eusebio Francisco Kino from the National Statuary Hall (USA). Artist: Suzanne Silvercruys .

The bay Bahía Kino in the Gulf of California is named after him, as is the city of Magdalena de Kino in Mexico ; schools, streets etc. in Mexico and Arizona also bear his name.

In his hometown, which is now in Italy, it was only in the 20th century that people became aware of the size of the cinema. He is immortalized among the hundred great American personalities to whom a statue was dedicated in the National Statuary Hall Collection in the Washington Capitol Complex . The terms "first rancher" and "first cowboy" underline its importance for US history.

In Mexico he is revered almost like a saint and the process for his beatification has begun. As part of the process, Pope Francis awarded him the heroic degree of virtue on July 10, 2020 .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. http://www.katholisches.info/2011/06/07/eusebius-franz-kuhn-padre-kino-vergessener-amerikamissionar-und-grunder-arizonas/
  2. ^ Promulgazione di Decreti della Congregazione delle Cause dei Santi. In: Daily Bulletin. Holy See Press Office , July 11, 2020, accessed July 11, 2020 (Italian).