The Pastoral-Theological Project of Fray Francisco Pareja and Timucua Authors in La Florida
"La lengua inteligible: The Pastoral-Theological Project of Fray Francisco Pareja and Timucua Authors in La Florida" by Timothy Johnson, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Religion at Flagler College, is the second lecture of the Franciscan Zoom Lecture Series - Winter 2025 Semester, hosted by the Franciscan School of Theology at the University of San Diego.
Almost two hundred years before the arrival of Franciscans in California, friars were preaching the Gospel among the Timucua people in Northeast Florida. Their labors, which began in the 1570s, included promoting literacy and producing bi-lingual pastoral-theological texts, many of which are extant and intensely studied by linguists, historians, and theologians. This presentation examines the cultural-gender context of these efforts and the theological influences and pastoral implications of their interactions with the Timucua.
Timothy Johnson, PhD
Distinguished Professor of Religion at Flagler College
Dr. Timothy Johnson, is the Craig and Audrey Thorn Distinguished Professor of Religion at Flagler College in St. Augustine, Florida. A Senior Fulbright Scholar, he holds a Doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University (Italy). He is the author, co-author, editor, co-editor, or translator of seventeen books and eighty-two scholarly and popular articles. His publications have been translated into Dutch, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. In 2019 he uncovered in All Souls Library in Oxford, England, an unknown work in Latin, Spanish, and Timucua by Fr. Francisco Pareja and his Timucuan co-editors. He is currently working on a book with Prof. Anieszka Johnson of Flagler College entitled In a Mirror Darkly: Women in the Spanish-Timucua Exempla Literature of La Florida. He also served on the Historical Committee charged with investigating the possible canonization of the Apalachee Chief Antonio Inija and Companions.