José Sola Gomes

Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes: the man and the Missionary

He lived the Philosophy, as well as the Science,
but he did not forget to practice Charity

Part 1

 
I am honored by the wonderful opportunity, however undeserved, because I have to make a few comments regarding a divine missionary, because the Spirit of Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes was a missionary, as we are told by Humberto de Campos, in the book Brazil Heart of the Word, Homeland of the Gospel.

In this work, Humberto de Campos, through the hands of our unforgettable psychic Francisco Candido Xavier, told us in a séance presided by Angel Ismael, after this Angel had transmitted to all his words of peace and love endearing the importance of working for the deployment of the Gospel of Jesus in the country of the Cruise, he recalled that the Master of Masters had fulfilled His promise when He said He would send the Comforter, to remain forever with us.

And, turning to one of the disciples of Jesus, who was part of the host of Spirits engaged with Ishmael in God's desire to solidify the promised Comforter, which is Spiritism, he instructed him to reincarnate with the mission of unifying the spiritual movement in Brazil, since the Spiritist meetings in its early days had not developed a guide, each Spiritist Centre having its method and each one saying it was the bearer of the truth, which created disunity and hardship among the Spiritists.

Some of us, Spiritists, still serve the cause, as if the need to evolve is a duty, and this is so true that we need to take a vacation in carrying out the work we do at a Spiritist institution, claiming that we are tired, although the work we do in a Spiritist house is not supposed to tire us, and it is not stressful, or at least it should not be. In my view, it should be something we do with pleasure, not as an obligation.

Humberto de Campos tells us that the eyes of the disciple, after having been entrusted with the important mission, shed tears of gratitude to God and to Jesus, for the blessed opportunity, which he was granted by Ishmael, to be cooperating with the unification of the Spiritist movement, which makes it clear that he did not consider this call as a duty, but as a blessing, since it gave him the opportunity to do something to help the needy of Spirit and matter, as we shall see.

In August 1831, Bezerra de Menezes was born

Aware of the Universal Love Law, this disciple of Ishmael reincarnated on August 29, 1831, in the little “Riacho do Sangue”, state of Ceara. He was the son of Antonio Bezerra de Menezes, captain of the old militias and then lieutenant colonel in the National Guard, and Fabiana de Jesus Maria Bezerra.

Antonio Bezerra was an important local farmer, who "never measured sacrifices to help those who asked him for help". Such generosity eventually consumed his fortune, and large debts reached unbearable levels.

Antonio then went to each of his creditors, decided to hand over his assets to pay off the debts. The creditors, however, got together and decided that Colonel Bezerra should continue with his property. They signed a document that stated with legal force that the old Bezerra could stay with his property and "that he enjoyed his properties and would pay them as he could and when he wished, and that the creditors would be subject to losses they may have”. The old Bezerra, however, did not accept this decision. After much discussion, he decided that from then onwards he would simply be an administrator of the assets to its creditors. Therefore, he began to only live on the minimum he needed to support his family and many a times he was in need.

At this point, the boy Adolfo, the last son of the couple, was already ending the so-called preparatory course. The two older children had graduated in Law and the third one was still attending the second year at the Law School of Olinda, Pernambuco.

The small Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes was seven years old when he was taken by his mother to be enrolled in the public school “Vila do Frade”. In ten months the boy learned to read, write and do simple arithmetic. Four years later, when his father was politically persecuted, the family moved to Rio Grande do Norte. The small Adolfo "was enrolled in the public school of Latinity, in the “Serra dos Martins” and was run by the Jesuit priests" in Maioridade, today the city of Imperatriz. Two years later, the boy became so good in his studies that he even replaced the teacher.

At 25 he received his doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine

In 1846, the old Bezerra returned to the capital of Ceara, where the little Adolf was enrolled at the Lyceum, where his older brother was the Director. Having completed his studies, he wanted to be a physician, not a lawyer like his brothers. As there was no medical school in the Northeast, his father was forced to send him to the then host city of the Imperial Court, the city of Rio de Janeiro. He then told his son all that had happened to the family property, explaining the poverty they were going through. Relatives came up and raised four hundred thousand reis to pay for the trip to Rio. That is how Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes could take a ship to Rio de Janeiro.

The young Adolfo went to live in a boarding house, and it was with great difficulty that he managed to achieve his purpose, because he suffered many difficulties to pay his lodging and, therefore, had to work to be able to keep the rent on time. However, he was firm in his purpose. He managed to keep up his studies, and made his dream of becoming a doctor come true.

At twenty-two, he joined as an internal practitioner, at the Hospital of the Santa Casa de Misericordia. At 25, in 1856 he obtained his doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine of Rio de Janeiro, defending the "Cancer Diagnosis" thesis. At that time he abandoned his last name, and signed as Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes.

Having no money to set up an office, he entered into an agreement with a college friend, who had more resources, and began to share a room in the commercial center of the city.

During the months while the office was open, there were almost no patients. But the house where the physician Bezerra lived was full of patients. He began to meet the family patients first and then his friends. His fame spread through the neighborhood, and patients appeared; but no one paid because they were all poor people and the money issue was never mentioned.

Then a friend and a military physician, Dr. Manoel Feliciano Pereira de Carvalho, Head of Army Health Corps, decided to hire him as a military doctor. Dr. Feliciano was Head of the Surgery Section of the “Hospital da Misericordia”, where Dr. Bezerra had been practicing in 1852, when he was still studying the second year at the Medicine Faculty.

As Dr. Bezerra saw the work of a doctor

In 1856, the Imperial Government reformed the Army Health Corps, and appointed Dr. Feliciano as surgeon-major. He then called Bezerra to be his assistant and that's how, with a steady paying job, he began the path of the doctor of the poor.

Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes continued to help those who could not pay. His fame continued to spread and the office of the city center began to get busy and attended by patients, who could pay. The money he received was spent with his poor patients in medicines, clothing and also often an aid in cash.

The physician of the poor had a very high concept of what it meant to be a doctor.

He said:

"A doctor has no right to end a meal, or to ask whether it is near or far, when someone in distress knocks at his door. The doctor, who does not answer, because he has visits, because he worked a lot and is tired, or it is late at night, or the road is in bad conditions, or the weather is bad, or if it is far or up a hill, the one who asks for a car to take him to someone, who has not even got the money to pay the prescription, or tells the person that cries at his door to go and look for another physician – this one is not a doctor, but a medicine dealer, who works to collect principal and interest of graduation expenses. This is a wretched being that sends to another professional, the angel of charity that came to visit him and brought him an opportunity that could satisfy the thirst for wealth of this Spirit, the only offering of charity that never will be lost in the ups and downs of life".

With his life now more organized, he decided to marry. He found his love in the person of Maria Candida Lacerda and they were married on November 6, 1858. At that time, Dr. Bezerra had a stable social life: besides being a physician, he was a journalist and wrote for major newspapers in the city; and in the military he was highly respected.

It did not take long for someone to offer him a position in a political party for the elections of the Legislative Power.

Why Dr. Bezerra gave up his military career

Maria, his wife, was one of the major persons to encourage Bezerra de Menezes’ candidature. The people of Sao Cristovao, a suburb of Rio de Janeiro, where he lived and attended as a physician, also wanted to have him to represent them at the City Council.

There was a moment when a tentative was made to contest his diploma under the pretext that the military could not be elected. Bezerra had to choose between the military and the political career. Following his wife’s advice, he renounced his military rank and embraced the politics.

Fate, however, reserved him a difficult ordeal for the year 1863. After a brief and sudden illness, his wife passed away in less than twenty days, leaving her husband with two children, one with three and the other with a year of age.

The blow of this unexpected widowhood worked on his religious feelings. Pain always brings up this issue. In search of consolation, Dr. Bezerra began to read the Bible frequently. He was now feeling the vertical expansion that pain gives the souls that suffer by connecting them to God.

At that time, Spiritism was expanding worldwide. In 1869, Allan Kardec disembodied in Paris, leaving the Spiritist Codification consolidated for Humanity. Kardec’s ideas were revolutionary and called the attention of researchers and scientists in every corner of the world. With the Encoder disembodied, the work to enlist new Spiritists was left.

In Brazil, mainly in the capital, the city of Sao Sebastiao do Rio de Janeiro, European influences were very strong. Homeopathy was becoming popular gradually, especially in the Spiritist media, and had as one of its first experimenters the bulwark of the Republic Jose Bonifacio de Andrada e Silva, who corresponded with Hahnemann, the founder of homeopathy. As a doctor, discussions on homeopathic therapy also interested Dr. Bezerra de Menezes and cures credited to this treatment reached his ears.

Dr. Carlos Travassos had undertaken the first translation of the works of Allan Kardec and also translated into the Portuguese language, "The Book of Spirits."

How Dr. Bezerra became acquainted with the Spiritist Doctrine

As soon as the mentioned book was published, he took a copy to Dr. Bezerra de Menezes, handing it with a dedication. The episode was described as follows by the future Doctor of the Poor:

"He gave it to me in town and I lived in Tijuca (a suburb in Rio de Janeiro), an hour's tram ride. I left with the book and since I had nothing else to do during the trip, I said to myself: Oh, well, I will not go to Hell if I read this… Also, it is ridiculous to confess my ignorance regarding this philosophy, if I have already studied all the philosophical schools! So thus thinking, I opened the book and I could not stop, as it had happened with the Bible. I read it. But I found nothing new for my Spirit.

However, now all was new to me! ... I had already read and listened to all that was in “The Book of Spirits”. I was very concerned with this wonderful fact and I said to myself: it seems I was a Spiritist unaware of it, or as it is commonly said, a born Spiritist”.

Spiritism was spreading, very much aided by the practices of homeopathic and Spiritist doctors, who had also, began to do charity through their mediumship. One of these doctors was Joao Gonçalves do Nascimento and many colleagues of Bezerra de Menezes spoke of healings through this medium. And they spoke so much about it, that one day Bezerra decided to ask him for a prescription just by sending a piece of paper saying only, "Adolfo, so many years old, living in Tijuca". It did not take long and he received a reply with the correct diagnosis of his stomach trouble.

Dr. Bezerra was so impressed with the accuracy of his diagnosis that he decided to ask for prescriptions for people who had psychological problems - madness was one of the areas that Dr. Bezerra more studied.

He followed the development of the treatment in his patients and then after simply watching the work done regarding the treatment of obsessions, he decided to actively participate in this type of treatment. In view of the Doctrine, people with mental illness are people who may have mental problems due to biological causes detectable by human science and also due to the influence of disembodied Spirits also sick. (This article will be completed in the next issue of this magazine).