A national mission in the times of Maximum Illud

The Holy See and Portugal’s missionary policies in Africa

Abstract

The First World War had devastating consequences to Christian missionary activities, with thousands of missionaries deployed to the front or arrested due to their nationalities. The war’s nationalistic frictions did not spare the religious field. As before, Christian missionaries were seen as representatives of their own countries rather than messengers of their religious denominations. In a way, Benedict XV’s apostolic letter Maximum Illud was the response to those national (and imperialistic) dissensions in the Catholic missionary world by fostering a more supranational consciousness on missionaries’ minds.

This supranational and Papal-directly-supervised mission was far from complying with Portugal’s old and persisting understandings of a mission submitted to and working on behalf of the imperial state. Despite Portuguese laic policies towards the Catholic Church (namely the Separation regime), the Catholic missions remained a nationalising tool, a concept that disputed the Holy See’s insights on the goals of the missionary work. Although pontifical officials held assertive judgements regarding Portuguese missionary policies, Rome sought a less confrontational relationship with Lisbon even after the publication of Maximum Illud. The Holy See understood how the Catholic missions were indispensable to Portugal and in which way a passive collaboration would ultimately benefit the Catholic evangelisation in Portuguese Africa.

Keywords: Catholic Mission, Portuguese Empire, Holy See, Maximum Illud.