Pontiff recalls 400th anniversary of Lithuanian missionary’s arrival in India
August 26, 2025
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CWN Editor's Note: Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of His Holiness, sent a telegram in the Holy Father’s name to the cardinal archbishop of Goa, India, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the first Lithuanian missionary’s arrival in India.
In recalling Father Andrius Rudamina, SJ, the Pontiff “prays that the celebration of such generosity and courage in bringing the saving message of the Gospel to all peoples will encourage many in our own times to respond with similar patience and ingenuity to the task of evangelization,” Cardinal Parolin wrote.
In its article on the papal telegram, Vatican News, the news agency of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, erroneously reported that Father Rudamina’s 1625 arrival in India “marked the first time a son of St. Ignatius of Loyola set foot in the vast Indian subcontinent.” The first Jesuit missionary to arrive in India was not Father Rudamina, but St. Francis Xavier, who arrived in Goa in 1542.
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