Santa Maria (D. Fr. José de)

This pious bishop of Funchal was the son of Luís de Saldanha, a viador of the household of Queen D. Luísa de Gusmão, and D. Violante de Mendonça. Embracing the monastic life, he entered the Capuchin order and served as a lecturer in arts and theology, as well as in other important positions.

D. Pedro 2nd appointed him bishop of this diocese in 1689, being confirmed by Pope Alexander VIII on March 6, 1690. On November 25 of that year, he received episcopal consecration from the hands of Cardinal de Lencastre.

In March 1691, he entered his diocese, dedicating himself entirely to the shepherding of his flock. He visited the parishes of his bishopric several times, despite the roughness of the roads and the difficulty of transportation and accommodations in the places he visited. He was very zealous in the observance of the teaching of Christian doctrine, having a pastoral printed in which this matter was regulated and imposed with all rigor. He convened a council in the diocese, in which serious provisions were taken regarding many points of ecclesiastical discipline that had long fallen into disuse.

D. Fr. José de Santa Maria was of a resigned and kind nature and suffered with true Christian humility the abuses and vexations of the Captain-General D. Rodrigo da Costa, who, in addition to his atrabilious and despotic nature, had the manifest protection of his relatives, who belonged to the first nobility and held the highest positions in the nation.

After a short episcopate of five years, he requested and obtained his transfer, being placed in one of the main sees of the Kingdom, in consideration of his great merits and virtues. Transferred to the bishopric of Porto, he died there, with the reputation of a saint, on October 26, 1708, according to D. Antonio Caetano de Sousa.

He left Madeira on September 15, 1696, the day he left the episcopal administration of this diocese.