Luo Wenzao (27 February 1691) was the first person of Chinese ethnicity to be appointed as a Catholic bishop. After the Qing dynasty proscribed Christianity and banished foreign missionaries in 1665, Luo became the only person in charge of the Catholic missions in China. In 1674, the Holy See first appointed Luo as a bishop. He declined it but accepted his second appointment in 1679. Due to opposition from Dominicans, he was consecrated as the apostolic vicar of Nanjing in 1685 and held the position until his death in 1691.
Although a Dominican himself, Luo held tolerant views that were closer to those of Jesuits in the Chinese Rites controversy. Luo was an active participant in the controversy: he consecrated Chinese priests and argued for the acceptance of Chinese rituals for the sake of preserving the early Catholic Church in China. Luo had studied at the University of Santo Tomas, Manila, and in addition to his Chinese heritage, Luo was proficient in Spanish and Latin.
Along with other Dominicans, Luo edited Xingshen Shiyi (), a 1673 Chinese Catholic theology book by Raimundo del Valle. Luo also wrote a Latin epitaph in 1690; he is the namesake of Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages, Taiwan. His date of birth is not known and there remains controversy over his real name.
Naming
Many historians agree Luo's given name was Wenzao (), his courtesy name was Ruding (), and his art name was Wocun (). In 2019, Song Liming proposed Luo's given name was Wenzhao () and his courtesy name was Zonghua (). According to Song, Luo's name may have been mistaken because Luo's tomb was destroyed in 1862 and because Joseph de La Serviere might have confused Luo with , another Ming Chinese Catholic, in his book Les Anciennes Missions de la Compagnie de Jésus en Chine, 1552–1814. The 1673 work Xingshen Shiyi by also lists Luo's given name as Wenzhao.
Other sources have romanized Luo's Chinese name differently. The French magazine Le Petit Messager de Ningpo called him "Lo Ngo Chai" in a 1933 issue and "Ngo Ts'uen" in a 1940 issue, according to his art name. Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages calls him "Wenzao Lo". When translating Yan Kejia's text Catholic Church in China, Chen Shujie wrote Luo's name as "Luo Wencao".
Luo was also known as "Gregorio Lopez" in Spanish. He took the baptismal name Gregorio when he was baptized in 1633; upon entering the Dominican novitiate in the Philippines in 1650, his last name was registered as Lopez. A 2017 article by Pablo Robert Moreno uses his Spanish name. The spelling of this name varies across languages: Luo called himself "Gregorius Lopes" in the Latin text of a 1690 stele, and Joseph Tardif de Moidrey called him "Grégoire Lopez" in the 1914 French-language work .
Early life It is uncertain when Luo Wenzao was born, and sources list different years and dates. Luo Yiming said in a 1997 journal article he was born in either 1611 or 1616. Miguel Angel San Román said: "1615 (or 1616) seems the most probable". Yan Kejia used 1616 in his A Brief History of the Catholic Church in China. In his Biographies of Figures in Chinese Catholic History, said Luo was born in 1617. In 2019, Song Liming said Luo's exact birthdate is 18 October 1617, according to two copies of Luo's epitaph that are stored in the Roman Jesuits Archives.
Many sources agree Luo was born in Fu'an, Fujian. He was born to Buddhist parents but his village had many Christians. His father's name was Li Zhu () and his mother's last name was Liu ().
In 1633, the Dominican missionary Juan Bautista Morales and the Franciscan missionary () opened in Fu'an. Caballero baptized Luo on 24 September of that year, and Luo took the baptismal name Gregorio, the patron saint of the Franciscan province in the Philippines. In an epitaph Luo wrote for Caballero in 1690, he called Caballero his "spiritual father".
Travels and missionary work (1634–1649) After his baptism, Luo first accompanied foreign missionaries on their travels and visits. In 1634, Luo and Caballero reached Nanjing to visit Francesco Sambiasi. However, some Jesuits were concerned that their visit would disrupt Sambiasi's mission, so they kidnapped Luo and Caballero and sent them back to Fujian. Then, in 1635, Luo and the Dominican missionary Francisco Diaz embarked on a trip to Manila to report the Chinese Rites controversy to the Catholic Church, but they were captured by a Dutch group and did not reach Manila. In 1637, Luo went to Beijing with other Dominican priests to explain their mission to the emperor and debate against anti-Christian officials. Johann Adam Schall von Bell intended to introduce him to evangelize in Korea, but Luo was detained when he arrived in Beijing and sent back to Fujian.
Around 1637–1638, Luo and other missionaries went to evangelize in Dingtou (), Fujian. The local Buddhists opposed their Catholic mission. In 1638, Luo and three other Franciscans fled towards Macau but were captured in Ningde. Luo was jailed for 23 days and beaten with clubs. He then went into exile in Macau and Manila in 1639.
In 1640, Luo traveled from Manila to Macau with Dominican priests Juan Bautista Morales and Francisco Diez. In 1644, Luo left for Manila for the second time with Caballero and several Carmelite nuns. Due to inclement weather, they landed in Thuận Hóa, Vietnam, where Luo was almost killed by locals. The group left Vietnam in early 1645 and arrived in Manila on 20 May of that year. In Manila, Luo was introduced to the Dominicans, and moved to the Dominican convent, and later the University of Santo Tomas. In a 1689 letter to the Propaganda Fide, Luo said he studied Spanish and Latin in Manila, and his theology was worse than other subjects. In 1647, Domingo González sent Luo back to China to take provisions to the missionaries there.
In 1649, when Morales and Caballero returned to China, Luo met them in Anhai, Fujian, despite the ongoing war between Ming and Qing in the province. When Caballero decided to evangelize in Korea, Luo accompanied him to Beijing.
Dominican Order and priesthood On 1 January 1650, in Fu'an, Luo became a novice of the Dominican Order and received the habit. He made the simple profession on the feast day of St. Thomas Aquinas in 1651. In 1652, he evangelized in Fujian, building a church and a Dominican office in . According to Fang Hao, based on the records of the office of the archbishop of Manila, Luo became a full member of the Dominican Order in Manila in 1654, and became a priest on 4 July in the same year. The Chinese community in Manila made a grand celebration for him. Many historians consider Luo to be the first Chinese Catholic priest. However, San Román did not consider Luo to be the first Chinese priest. He claimed that the first one was Dionisio de la Cruz. Missionary work (1655–1673)
In 1655, the Dominican prior provincial of Manila sent Luo back to China to evangelize. In early July, Luo embarked for Fujian with four other Dominicans, including Raimundo del Valle. Their mission was impacted by the warfare between the Qing regime and Zheng Chenggong. According to San Román, Luo's activity between 1656 and 1664 "has not yet been sufficiently researched". According to San Román, Luo stayed in Fujian in this period, where he administered sacraments, rescued captives during the war, and baptized locals. In 1657, Luo appeared in Xiamen with Vittorio Ricci to assist the arrival of some foreign missionaries. Luo was in Quanzhou in 1658.
In 1664, Yang Guangxian attacked Catholic Christianity in his articles to the imperial court. In 1665, the Qing imperial court accepted his argument, , and banished all foreign missionaries to Guangzhou (Canton). Some missionaries hid and could not conduct their missions in public. Since Luo was not a foreign missionary, he remained free in China and became the sole person in charge of the Catholic mission during the proscription from 1665 to 1671.
In May 1665, Luo went to Manila to report the destruction of the Catholic mission in China to the Dominican prior provincial, and sought economic support from the Dominicans, the Franciscans, and the Jesuits. When he returned to China, he first visited Francisco Varo and five other missionaries who were hiding in Shandong. After returning to Fujian, he went to Guangzhou and Macau to visit the banished foreign missionaries. Around 1667, Luo visited 178 churches in the provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Guangdong, Shanxi, Shandong, Sichuan, Jiangsu, Anhui, and Hebei. He baptized 556 people in Fujian and the adjacent coastal region, and about 2,000 people in other provinces. The Jesuit visitor of Macau Luis da Gama reported Luo's ministry in 1667 and confirmed it in a 1668 letter:
Process of becoming a bishop
Luo received recommendations from several members of the clergy. François Pallu and Pierre Lambert de la Motte met Domingo Fernández Navarrete in Madagascar on their way to Vietnam. When they heard of Luo from Navarrete, they wrote to the Pope asking him to appoint Luo as a bishop. Gabriel de Magalhães, the head of the Jesuit missions in China, also thought highly of Luo despite him being a Dominican.
First episcopal appointment (1674)
On 31 July 1673, the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (Propaganda Fide) discussed the possibility of appointing Luo as a bishop. The following month, Navarrete and the associate prior of the Dominican Province of Rome recommended Luo to the Propaganda Fide, respectively. The Propaganda Fide later recommended Luo to the College of Cardinals. On 2 October 1673, the Propaganda Fide resolved to petition the Pope to appoint Luo as a bishop in partibus infidelium.
In 1674, Pope Clement X appointed Luo the titular bishop of Basilinopolis and the apostolic vicar of Nanjing to administrate the provinces of Beijing, Shandong, Shanxi, Henan, Shaanxi, and Korea. The date of his appointment is contested; according to Miguel Angel San Román, Luo's appointment occurred in 1675, based on a letter of Luo to the King of Spain. Joseph de Moidrey said Luo only heard about his appointment in 1677. Luo intended to decline his appointment; in 1677, he wrote to the apostolic vicars of Cochinchina and Siam to ask them to convey his message to Rome, though the vicars first advised him to accept the appointment. In 1677, Luo resigned his appointment because he was not confident enough to take the responsibilities and because his appointment could not succeed without the consent of Portugal, which had the protectorate of missions in China at the time.
According to Zhang Kai, there were several other reasons for Luo's resignation. Zhang said some missionaries would not welcome Luo as a bishop due to their nationalistic sentiments; other foreign missionaries would oppose Luo's appointment because he was considered inferior to them in theology and Latin; Luo's tolerance of traditional Chinese culture was different from the Dominicans' stance in the Chinese Rites controversy; and Luo was under the jurisdiction of the Dominican Province of the Philippines, which was under the protection of Spain so he could not fulfil the appointment without Spain's consent.
Antonius Calderon, the Prior of the Dominican Province of the Philippines, also strongly opposed Luo's appointment because Luo's more-tolerant views on the Chinese Rites controversy differed from Dominican views. If Luo had accepted the appointment, Calderon threatened to expel him from the Dominican Order, recall all the Spanish missionaries from China, and end all subsidies to the Chinese missions. To mitigate the situation, Pallu suggested appointing Francisco Varo as Luo's assistant so Luo's candidacy would be more acceptable to the Dominicans. Varo, however, also opposed Luo's appointment and suggested appointing Juan de Palafox y Mendoza instead.
Second episcopal appointment (1679)