MORALES, JUAN BAUTISTA de. - Dominican missionary, b. in Écija (Andalusia) c. 1597, d. in Funing (China) on 17 Sept. 1664. Having become a religious in his homeland, around 1620 he departed as a missionary for Manila; he then evangelized Cambodia (1629-33), and subsequently penetrated into the Mongol Empire.
He devoted himself with the utmost zeal to the conversion of the infidels. He often suffered persecutions and tortures; he was even scourged and mortally wounded on account of the faith. He took part in the discussion on the question of the Chinese Rites against the Jesuits, for the resolution of which he was sent to Rome (1643). Returning to China (1649), he was always a vigilant guardian of the purity of the faith. He wrote many pamphlets concerning the controversy over the Chinese Rites; among these: *Quaesita septemdecim* (Rome 1645) presented to the Congregation of Rites. He also wrote a *Historia evangelica del reyno de la China*, a Life of St. Dominic in Chinese, a vocabulary and a grammar of the Chinese language, which he knew to perfection.