The lives and deaths of fathers Fray Marcos de Saavedra and Fray
Juan Rodriguez
[January 6, 1631, died in the convent of Sancto Domingo father Fray
Marcos de Saavedra, a native of Villamayor in the district of Veles,
a son of Sancta Cruz at Villa Escusa in La Mancha. He left España
in 1623, in which year he was ordained priest in Mexico. He was
a minister in Nueva Segovia, and understood the language of the
natives very perfectly. He composed in it a book of sermons for
the whole year; and a grammar for those who might learn it later,
abbreviating the old grammar. He was a devout and zealous religious,
and patiently suffered the long illness which preceded his death.
On the seventh of May in this same year father Fray Juan Rodriguez
departed from this wretched life for a happier one, in the convent of
Sancto Domingo at Nueva Segovia. He was a native of the bishopric of
Salamanca, and assumed the habit in the famous convent of San Estevan
in that city. After he finished his course in arts and theology,
he was assigned to the convent of Sancto Domingo in the city of
Guadalaxara. He was a friar of exceptional devotion and received great
favors from the holy Virgin and from St. Joseph and St. Dominic,
who visited one of his penitents and directed his life. With the
approbation of the Lord, father Fray Juan desired to go to the convent
of the order in the town of Aranda de Duero, which was famous for its
observance of the rule. Here he was master of the novices, and hence
he was called by God to this province. He was sent to Nueva Segovia,
where he learned the language of the natives, and within five months
was able to preach to them in it. He was much beloved by the natives,
and also by the religious, who all desired to be in his company. His
devout and exemplary life edified all wherever he went. After he had
been attacked by an illness which proved to be his last, he was sent
with some Spanish soldiers to bring back some Christians Indians who
were in the mountains, and who wished to return, but were prevented
by their neighbors, who threatened them with death. In spite of his
illness, he accepted the responsibility and went with the troops. The
soldiers, growing impatient with the delay of the Indians, who feared
them, desired to capture them with the aid of some friendly Indians
who accompanied the expedition. The father, however, persuaded them
to wait for another day; and after he had spent the night in prayer
he succeeded by his gentleness and his arguments in persuading those
Indians to give up their lost way of life and to return. There were
in all more than one hundred and thirty persons. After his return
his illness grew rapidly worse, and he died in the month of May.]