[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 19 (Tuesday, February 8, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E143-E144]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  PADRE EUSEBIO FRANCISCO KINO, S.J. ``THE NOBLEST SOUTHWESTERNER OF 
                                 ALL''

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. RAUL M. GRIJALVA

                               of arizona

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, February 8, 2011

  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, former Secretary of the Interior and 
Arizona Congressman Stewart L. Udall captured the essence of the life 
and legacy of Jesuit missionary and explorer Eusebio Francisco Kino 
when he wrote ``His vision--and his ability to command the affection 
and loyalty of the native peoples he encountered--made him the 
preeminent pathfinder and mission builder in the West. . . . [He] dared 
to believe that, armed only with love, he could mount a horse and 
discover new lands and peoples and at the same time serve his Lord by 
extending the boundaries of Christendom.''
  Padre Kino was a mission builder and itinerant priest who made 50 
expeditions totaling over 19,000 miles beyond the then Spanish frontier 
into today's Arizona and California. Kino's phenomenal horseback rides 
of great distance and breakneck speed required all the physical and 
mental strength that only the best of the world's horsemen could 
possess. For this reason Padre Kino is historically known as ``The 
Padre on Horseback.''
  Padre Kino was born Eusebio Chini in 1645 in the village of Segno 
located in the Italian Alps--twenty miles from the birthplace of the 
grandfather of Arizona's former U.S. Senator Dennis DeConcini. Padre 
Kino gave up his career as an Old World university professor to become 
a missionary in the New World. For his last 24 years he labored 
tirelessly as a Catholic priest in his Sonoran Desert parish--the 
50,000 square mile Pimeria Alta (now southern Arizona and northern 
Sonora).
  Before this assignment, Padre Kino worked for 3 years in the 
inhospitable deserts of Baja California but the ill-fated settlement 
effort was abandoned under order of the Spanish King. Padre Kino was 
saddened to leave the native people of Baja, but for the rest of his 
life Padre Kino never forgot them. He helped renew the missionary 
efforts and supplied much needed food and supplies from his missions 
farms and ranches on the other side of the Gulf of California.
  As part of his work, Padre Kino was an accomplished builder, 
agriculturist, and cattleman.
  He founded 24 missions including the beautiful Arizona mission San 
Xavier del Bac near Tucson--still an active parish church in the heart 
of the San Xavier District of the O'odham Nation. He also founded the 
missions at Tumacacori and Guevavi which are now part of our national 
park system's Tumacacori National Historical Park. He was among the 
first Europeans to see the Casa Grande Ruins--now another of our 
country's national monuments.
  Padre Kino introduced horses, cattle and other herd animals, and the 
cultivation of Old World fruits and wheat into Arizona. Under his 
instruction the native people quickly learned new agricultural 
practices which stabilized their food supply. By his words in official 
reports to his superiors and by his actions in his work Padre Kino 
expressed his heartfelt conviction that missionary efforts begins with 
respect for the native people and the physical betterment of their 
lives.
  Padre Kino was also a frontier diplomat who promoted peace among the 
warring tribes he encountered, and between the native people and the 
Spanish military. He demanded that the Spanish military and settlers 
respect the native people as their fellow humans. Before his arrival to 
the Pimeria, Kino obtained a decree from King Carlos II that prohibited 
the native people from being enslaved to work in the Spanish mines and 
haciendas. He defended the native people from the claims of powerful 
interests who coveted their lands and labor and who relentlessly 
attempted to undermine his missionary efforts right up until his final 
days on earth.

[[Page E144]]

  Padre Kino was a gifted scientist and cartographer having been a 
student and a professor in Europe's greatest universities. His careful 
scientific observations made during his journeys of exploration 
resulted in the first reliable definitive historical chronicles and 
accurate maps of these previously unknown lands. His maps of the 
Pimeria Alta and its adjacent regions were widely published in Europe 
during his lifetime and were used for over a century afterwards.
  During Padre Kino's lifetime it was the commonly held belief that 
California was an island and separated from the North American 
mainland. At the Blue Shell Conference at San Xavier Mission he 
consulted with the native people throughout the region about the 
widespread trading of abalone shells. He heard from them that the 
shells originated on the Pacific Ocean coast of Baja California. Padre 
Kino then hypothesized that California was not an island and that a 
land route to Baja California did exist. Numerous expeditions to the 
Colorado River and its delta were necessary to prove his hypothesis. 
His discovery led to renewed efforts to build new missions serving the 
destitute native peoples of Baja California during his lifetime. It 
also prepared the way for the founding of the City of San Francisco, in 
present day California, by the De Anza expedition. These undertakings 
could have only succeeded with the support provided by the extensive 
chain of missions, farms and ranches built by the native people and 
Padre Kino.
  Padre Kino died in Magdalena, Sonora on March 15, 1711 after saying 
the Mass for dedication for a new chapel for St. Francisco Xavier, his 
patron saint. His death bed consisted of his usual bed on the ground. 
His bed was made from his horse blankets with his saddle as a pillow. 
Padre Kino died at the age of 66.
  Through his great faith and intellect, his gentle charisma and 
stamina, Padre Kino forever transformed the lives and hearts of all 
people living in the Pimeria Alta and the Californias. The native 
peoples of the region still revere and love their Padre on Horseback.
  In 1965 Padre Kino was honored by the citizens of Arizona as the 
State's founder and its preeminent pioneer by the dedication of his 
statue in the Statuary Hall of the U.S. Capitol Building. The ceremony 
was attended by dignitaries from all over the world. This event was the 
catalyst to the Federal Government of Mexico to successfully complete 
in May 1966 Padre Kino's mortal remains. This ended a 40-year search 
for his grave. In May 2006 the Archdiocese of Hermosillo submitted the 
official documents to the Vatican to start the process of Canonization 
for Padre Kino's formal recognition as a saint by the Catholic Church.
  Now on this day, March 15, 2011 which is the 300th year anniversary 
of his death, the Kino Heritage Society is issuing its own designed 
private U.S. postage stamp and cancel mark. This stamp will be 
cancelled by the United States Postal Service at a community-wide event 
honoring Padre Kino at the Postal History Foundation in Tucson, 
Arizona.
  Other extensive celebrations of Padre Kino's life and legacy are 
being held this year in Italy, Mexico and other communities in the 
United States for this heroic man described by the noted historian 
Lawrence Clark Powell as ``the noblest Southwesterner of all.''

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