Editing Jesuits (section)

====Colonial Brazil====
[[File:Nobrega2.jpg|thumb|left|[[Manuel da Nóbrega]] on a commemorative Portuguese stamp of the 400th anniversary of the foundation of [[São Paulo]], Brazil]]
[[File:Brazil 18thc JesuitFather.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|A Jesuit in 18th century, Brazil]]

[[Tomé de Sousa]], first [[Governorate General of Brazil|Governor General of Brazil]], brought the first group of Jesuits to the colony. The Jesuits were officially supported by the [[List of Portuguese monarchs|King]], who instructed [[Tomé de Sousa]] to give them all the support needed to Christianize the indigenous peoples.

The first Jesuits, guided by [[Manuel da Nóbrega]], Juan de Azpilcueta Navarro, Leonardo Nunes, and later [[Joseph of Anchieta|José de Anchieta]], established the first Jesuit missions in [[Salvador, Bahia|Salvador]] and in [[São Paulo dos Campos de Piratininga]], the settlement that gave rise to the city of [[São Paulo]]. Nóbrega and Anchieta were instrumental in the defeat of the French colonists of [[France Antarctique]] by managing to pacify the [[Tupi people|Tamoio]] natives, who had previously fought the Portuguese. The Jesuits took part in the foundation of the city of [[Rio de Janeiro]] in 1565.

The success of the Jesuits in converting the Indigenous peoples is linked to their efforts to understand the native cultures, especially their languages. The first grammar of the [[Tupian languages|Tupi]] language was compiled by José de Anchieta and printed in [[Coimbra]] in 1595. The Jesuits often gathered the natives in communities (the [[Reductions|Jesuit reductions]]), where the natives worked for the community and were evangelised.

The Jesuits had frequent disputes with other colonists who wanted to enslave the natives. The action of the Jesuits saved many natives from being enslaved by Europeans, but also disturbed their ancestral way of life and inadvertently helped spread infectious diseases against which the natives had no natural defenses. Slave labor and trade were essential for the economy of Brazil and other American colonies, and the Jesuits usually did object to the enslavement of African peoples, criticized the conditions of slavery.{{sfn|Campbell|1921|pp=87ff}} In cases where individual Jesuit priests criticized the institution of African slavery, they were censored and sent back to Europe.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Chamberlin |first1=William |date=4 June 2018 |title=Silencing Genocide: The Jesuit Ministry in Colonial Cartagena de Indias and its Legacy |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0021934718778718 |journal=Journal of Black Studies |volume=49 |issue=7 |pages=672–693 |doi=10.1177/0021934718778718 |s2cid=149464521 |access-date=23 April 2022 |archive-date=23 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220423190057/https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0021934718778718 |url-status=live }}</ref>