MARTINO de AZPILCUETA (Navarrus). — Moral theologian and canonist, born on 13 May 1492 and called “Navarro” after his place of origin (Barasoain, in Navarra), died in Rome on 21 June 1586. He was a cousin of St. Francesco Saverio, with whom he maintained an epistolary correspondence; doctor (1541) and professor of canon law at Cahors (before 1520) and then at Toulouse, where he had studied and been ordained; at Salamanca he was professor of the decretum (1532), and subsequently of the prima (1533) at Coimbra, where he organized the University (1538–55).
He intervened as a theologian in the dispute between Filippo II and Paolo IV, coming close to schism because of his excessive compliance with the king. Nevertheless, he defended against the same king,
and in Rome, as an advocate, the celebrated archbishop Carranza; for this the king never forgave him. In Rome he was esteemed by Popes Pio V, Gregorio XIII, and Sisto V; he was appointed consultor to the Penitentiary and received the cardinalate only because of the opposition of Filippo II. Against him M. published an indignant vindication: Epistola apologetica ad... ducem Albuquerqueensem (Rome 1570). A highly refined man of austere life, full of charity toward his neighbor, he must be numbered among the foremost figures of his age as a moralist, canonist, and ascetical author. His works, repeatedly printed even after his death, were regarded, at least in part, as classics. Among the best known is his Manuale sive enchiridion confessoriorum et paenitentium (Antwerp 1573), which is a reworking of his Manual de confesores y penitentes (Coimbra 1553). His works on law are innumerable; particularly well known, among others, is his De redditibus beneficiorum ecclesiasticorum (Rome 1568, 1574; first edition in Spanish, Valladolid 1566). He also wrote many other works on the Breviary, religious orders, ecclesiastical property, and so forth, which were published in a complete edition at Rome (3 vols., 1590), Lyons (1589–91), Venice (5 vols., 1602), and Cologne (2 vols., 1615).