PÉREZ, ESTEBAN

Discalced Franciscan mission preacher in Peru; b. Olite, Navarre, Spain, 1854; d. Lima, Peru, 1934. Starting out from the Colegio de Ocopa and from the Descalzos of Lima, which gave them their name, Discalced missionaries constituted the most powerful force for the preservation and consolidation of Christian life in peru and neighboring countries from the middle of the 19th century. The Catholic Church was in a critical state because of the continued shortage of priests, the spread of rationalism, secret societies, regalistic governments, antireligious laws, secular teaching, and sectarian propaganda. The evangelical action of the Discalced Fathers extended itself throughout Peru, embracing the aristocracy, the middle class, the clergy, religious communities, and reaching even to the Quechua and Aymará–speaking native population and the eastern jungle tribes. The missionaries, in well-trained groups of two, four, or six, traveled through the territory of more than a million square kilometers giving missions of one-and-a-half or two months in the principal cities, one month or 15 days in the smaller cities, and a proportional length of time in less-populated areas. To the clergy, the intellectuals, influential groups, students, and religious communities they gave courses of religious exercises. Esteban Pérez was a typical example of these missionaries. A vigorous man of convincing eloquence, great zeal, and untiring activity, he gave missions in Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, and California. He encouraged social work and organized and gave new life to Lima's devotion to the Señor de los Milagros. In order to consolidate the mission gains, he wrote various works, among them the Devocionario manual (Lima 1960, 42 ed.), of which it has been said that "it has converted more souls than it has letters." In 1932 he delivered the funeral oration for Leguìa, former president of Peru.

Bibliography: t. mori, "El padre Esteban Pérez," Colección Descalzos 6 (Lima 1944) 12–14.

[o. saiz]