Odilão Moura

Telmo Bello de Borba Moura OSB (2 May 1918 – 10 November 2010), better known by the religious name of Odilão Moura, was a Brazilian Roman Catholic priest, translator, philosopher and theologian.

Biography

Odilão Moura was born in Lorena, São Paulo, the third of the eight children of Captain José de Borba Moura and Olga Bello de Borba Moura. He studied at São Joaquim College, run by the Salesians, and moved to Rio de Janeiro to study medicine at the University of Brazil. But his enthusiasm did not last long. After one year, he gave up medicine, as he did with his law studies. The vocation for the priesthood spoke louder: in 1937, he entered the São Bento Monastery, and was ordained a priest in 1944.

With a degree in theology, he went on to teach at the Catholic University of Petrópolis and at PUC-Rio, as well as at the Theological School of the Brazilian Benedictine Congregation.

One of the founders of the Brazilian Academy of Philosophy, where he occupied chair 32, he had a great appreciation for St. Thomas Aquinas.

Dom Odilon died at the age of 92. He was buried in the cloister of the São Bento Monastery.

Works

• Atualidade de S. Tomás de Aquino (1974)
• As Idéias Católicas no Brasil (1978)
• Teologia e Teologias da Libertação (1985)
• Ecumenismo e Ensino Religioso na Escola Pública (1988)
• São João da Cruz, o Mestre do Amor (1991)
• Padre Penido: Vida e Pensamento (1995)
• O Padre Penido: Teólogo e Apóstolo da Liturgia (1995)