Francis Xavier was the 16th-century missionary and co-founder of the Jesuits called the “Apostle of the Indies.”
Born in 1506 in Xavier, Navarre, he studied in Paris, where he became a close companion of Ignatius of Loyola. In 1534, Xavier and six companions took vows that formed the foundation of the Society of Jesus, formally approved by Pope Paul III in 1540.
Xavier travelled to Portuguese India in 1541 and worked extensively in Goa and along the Fishery Coast. He later carried the Jesuit mission to Malacca, the Maluku Islands, Japan and, finally, the threshold of China, where he died on Shangchuan Island in 1552. His missions made him one of the most influential Catholic missionaries of the early modern period.
The title “Apostle of the Indies” refers especially to his work in Portuguese-controlled Asia. Ignatius of Loyola was Xavier’s fellow Jesuit founder, not the missionary identified by this title; Ignatius remained chiefly the order’s organizer and first superior general.