In 1622 Peter Lombard was asked by Pope Gregory XV to be a part of a Pontifical Commission into the affairs of Fr. Roberto De Nobili S.J. and his missionary activities incorporating local customary traditions in India. The commission included Cardinal Bellarmine and other notable theologians of the 17th century. Lombard, as President of the commission, was pivotal in the exoneration of De Nobili and subsequently the Church took a whole new view to inculturation of Christianity and its missions to the unchurched.