After dying in mid-sixteenth century in his archiepiscopal headquarters of Valencia in Spain, the Augustinian friar Tomas de Villanueva was officially recognized as a saint in the early seventeenth century, so when in May 28, 1665 the Holy Name Province Religious of Jesus of Barefoot Augustinian Hermits of the Philippine Islands granted precise powers to Juan de Borja, in his capacity as commissioner Attorney to pass by New Spain and found a home for missionaries in Mexico City, one can say that the cult to this saint was a current pride in Augustine religious, that could have been a reason to put the new hospice in Mexico under the patronage of his name.
Fray Juan de Borja shortly met his task, and although it appears that in the beginning it was called Hospice of Jesus Christ yet it passed into posterity, now rescued with his name Hospice of St. Thomas of Villanova. About the founder Fray Borja, Father Agustin Maria de Castro said he and his companions "combarcanos" saw his portrait in a painting at the foot of the stairs at the hospice in 1753, when he passed by Mexico from his native Spain, with destination the east.
The life of this institution ran along the remaining portion of the seventeenth century, around the following eighteenth century, but the consummation of the independence of Mexico announced an end to it, because the beatings it received then were only a foretaste of the rough and final sustained when the Spanish expelled in 1827 and beyond. Which is why the Spanish missionary friars could no longer stay, much less maintain their ownership and possession of the hospice and their wealth.
The part that remains in place, now turned into the Boutique Hotel Cortes is a beautiful two-storey building that runs the canvas of its facade to it. Upstairs, the elegance of the typical Baroque windows in Mexico City rise up to the ledge; the nobility and simplicity of the clear cantera, in contrast with the volcanic rock that covers the panels of the walls, are only part of the sumptuousness and elegance of the cover, which loads its lines and movements to the center, in which the door opens and on it the heart that symbolizes St. Augustine and a niche that is the kindly figure sculpture of St. Thomas of Villanova. In the frieze of the front is a medallion with the inscription: Sto. Tomas de Villanueva Year 1780.
FUENTE: BIBLIOTECA ITAM, ESTUDIOS. filosofía-historia-letrasOtoño 1986 ALFONSO MARTINEZ. Hospicios de Nueva España para misioneros del Oriente
