BECKER, CHRISTIAN EDMUND. - Of the Congregation of the Salvatorians, first apostolic prefect of Assam, and later founder of the medical-missionary Institute of Würzburg. Born on 22 Oct. 1875 in Elsoff, near Frankfurt am Main, died in Würzburg on 30 March 1937. Having completed his philosophical and theological studies in Rome, he also received there his priestly ordination in 1898. He was a professor and later rector of the studentate of Merano. In 1905 he was appointed apostolic prefect of Assam, which he governed until the war of 1914-18, following which, together with all his missionaries, he was interned and then expelled from India (1916). Since his return to India was by then deemed impossible, in 1921 he resigned the office of prefect. Around that time, German Catholics took a great interest in the problem of health care in the missions, and B. was invited to put his experience to their profit. He published (1921) his pamphlet Ärztliche Fürsorge in den Missionsländern; then, with the support of the missionary Orders and of the pontifical works in Germany, in 1922 he laid the foundations of the medical-missionary Institute of Würzburg. In 1924 he gave courses of lectures on missiology at the University of Würzburg, and in 1928 he received the appointment as honorary full professor at the same university.
B. also placed his activity as a writer at the service of the missionary cause; in 1923 he published the history of his mission (Im Stromtal des Brahmaputra, Munich, 2nd ed. Aachen 1927); in 1921 a study on the problem of the castes in India (Indisches Kastenswesen und christliche Mission, Aachen); he also wrote several biographies of missionaries. Subsequently he dealt with medical-missionary subjects, both in the organ of his institute (Jahrbuch für missionärztliche Fürsorge) beginning in 1924, and in the monograph Missionärztliche Kulturarbeit (Würzburg 1928).
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Giovanni B. Tragella