Saint Andrew Dũng-Lạc and his Companions, Martyrs – Readings

Commentary on Wisdom 3:1-9; Matthew 10:17-22

The Gospel reading is from Matthew. It is from the teaching that Jesus gives to his disciples before sending them out on their mission to do the same work he was doing. The reading gives a description of the kind of reception that they can expect in their missionary work.

It is a description of the experiences that Christians were already undergoing in parts of the Church when this gospel was written. And, it is a description of persecution that has taken place right through the history of the Church down to our own days.

Jesus warns his disciples that they will be hauled before courts and flogged. They will be called before kings and governors. And it will be an opportunity to give witness to their faith and loyalty to Christ and his Gospel. They are not to worry about what they will say. The right words will come when they need them, and this promise has been fulfilled many times.

One of the saddest features of these persecutions is that it will divide families—brother will betray brother, parents their children and vice versa. In short, they will be hated by many, not because of their criminal or immoral behaviour, but simply because of their allegiance to Christ and his Way. But those who hold out to the end will win a life that will never end.

The 117 martyrs we remember today, not to mention a much larger number of which there is now no written record, all went through the experiences listed by Jesus. Today we honour their memory and see the fruits of their sacrifices in the vibrant Church in Vietnam today.

The First Reading is from the Book of Wisdom and speaks about the fate of the dead. It is a reading often used in Requiem Masses. It applies all the more to the martyrs we commemorate today:

For the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God,
and no torment will ever touch them.
In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died,
and their departure was thought to be a disaster
and their going from us to be their destruction,
but they are at peace.
For though in the sight of others they were punished,
their hope is full of immortality.

Their sufferings were not final:

Having been disciplined a little, they will receive great good, because God tested them and found them worthy of himself…

And in their turn:

They will govern nations and rule over peoples, and the Lord will reign over them forever.

For those who have heard the call, whether they are Jews or ‘Greeks’ (i.e. Gentiles), Jesus Christ is clearly the power of God, the Word of God, the Wisdom of God:

For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. (1 Cor 1:25)

In the eyes of many, these martyrs’ life would be deemed a disaster. Yet their violent death is now a source of inspiration for Vietnamese Catholics today, who can still be harassed by an unbelieving government simply because of their faith.

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Saint Andrew Dũng-Lạc and his Companions, Martyrs

Christian missionaries first brought the Catholic faith to Vietnam during the 16th century. The first two apostolic vicariates were established in 1659.

The traditional Vietnamese religion is Buddhism, mixed with elements of Taoism, Confucianism and the cult of ancestors. When Christianity came with missionaries early in the 16th century, it was seen as a foreign element and during the following three centuries (1625-1886) became the object of persecution.

During the first 20 years of the 19th century, Christianity made steady progress, but this was dramatically interrupted by the persecutions under the Annamite emperors Minh-Mang (1820-40) and Tu Dúc (1847-83). From 1832, Minh-Mang banned all foreign missionaries and ordered Vietnamese Christians to renounce Christianity by trampling on a crucifix. Churches were to be destroyed and teaching Christianity forbidden. Many suffered death, and many others endured extreme hardship.

Altogether, during the first 200 years of Christianity in Vietnam, it is estimated that some 100,000 Christians were martyred, but there is little historical record of most of them. They came from the three Vietnamese kingdoms of Tonkin, Annam and Cochin China.

Imprisoned bishops, hardly 30 years old, were given a piece of bamboo as crozier and a paper mitre, while older priests were put on display in cages to be publicly mocked, although often with the opposite effect. Poor peasants were murdered for refusing to trample on a crucifix. Some of the tortures were barbaric, and the persecutions have been compared with those of ancient Rome.

Among the Vietnamese priests who suffered martyrdom was Andrew Dũng-Lạc, who was chosen to represent a first group of 117 who were martyred. His original name was Dũng An Tran. He was born about 1795 into a poor family in Bac-Ninh in north Vietnam. At the age of 12, the family was forced to move to Hanoi where his parents could find work. While there, Andrew met a Christian catechist who gave him food and shelter. He was also instructed in the Christian faith for three years before being baptised in Vinh-Tri and given the Christian name of Andrew.

After learning Chinese and Latin he became a catechist. He was then picked out to study theology and on 15 March, 1823 was ordained priest. As parish priest in Ke-Dâm he was an indefatigable preacher. He frequently fasted and lived a very simple life. His good example led many to become Christians.

In 1835, he was arrested and imprisoned under emperor Minh-Mang’s persecutions (this emperor has been called ‘Vietnam’s Nero’). However, Andrew was freed thanks to money given by members of his congregation. To avoid persecutions, he changed his name from Andrew Dũng to Andrew Lạc and moved to another prefecture. However, on 10 November, 1839, he was again arrested, this time with Peter Thi, another Vietnamese priest whom he was visiting to make his confession. Again, together with Peter Thi, he was liberated for a sum of money. But the period of freedom was brief. Once again, they were re-arrested and taken to Hanoi where they were subjected to dreadful tortures. On 21 December, 1839, they were beheaded. Andrew was beatified in the first group of Vietnamese martyrs on 27 May, 1900.

During this time, Christians were marked on their faces with the words ta dao (= false religion), husbands were separated from their wives, and children from their parents. Christian villages were destroyed and their possessions distributed.

Among the most significant of the martyrs was Théophane Venard of the Paris Mission. A schoolmaster’s son, he was born at Saint-Loup-sur-Thouet, Deux-Sèvres, in 1829. He joined the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris from the Poitiers diocese seminary and was ordained priest in 1852. In 1854, he was sent to Tonkin in a time of persecutions. Expelled from Nam-Dinh in 1856, he went to Hanoi, where renewed persecutions obliged him to hide in caves and small boats. Finally, he was arrested, placed in a bamboo cage, and ultimately in 1861, beheaded for the Christian faith. His letters and his example inspired the young Theresa of Lisieux to volunteer for the Carmelite convent at Hanoi. But because of her tuberculosis, she was not able to go. In 1865, Vénard’s decapitated body was brought back to his society’s church in Paris. With 19 other martyrs from this area, he was beatified in 1909.

In June 1862, a treaty between France and Annam guaranteed religious freedom. This marked the beginning of the end of the persecutions. The 117 martyrs were beatified in four groups, the first of them on 27 May, 1900 (Pope Leo XIII), the second (all Dominicans) on 20 May, 1906, a third group on 2 May, 1909 (both by Pope Pius X) and the last (including the two Spanish bishops) on 29 April, 1951 (Pope Pius XII). They were all canonised in Rome on 19 June, 1988 by Pope John Paul II.

Of the 117 martyrs celebrated today 96 were Vietnamese, and 21 foreign missionaries. Of the Vietnamese, 37 were priests and 59 lay people, among whom were catechists and members of third orders. One of them was a woman, a mother of six.

Of the missionaries, 11 were Spaniards—6 bishops and 5 priests, all Dominicans (OP), and 10 were French—2 bishops and 8 priests from the Société des Missions Etrangères de Paris (MEP, Paris Foreign Missions).

Of those who died, 76 were beheaded, 21 suffocated, 6 burnt alive, 5 mutilated and 9 died in prison as a result of torture. A detailed description of their sufferings is found in a moving letter written by seminarian Paul Le-Bao Tinh to the seminary of Ke Vinh in 1843:

I, Paul, chained for the name of Christ, wish to tell you the tribulations in which I am immersed every day, so that you, inflamed with love for God, may also lift up your praise to God, “for his mercy endures forever”. This prison is truly the image of the eternal Hell: to the cruelest tortures of all types, such as fetters, iron chains and bonds, are added hate, vindictiveness, calumny, indecent words, interrogations, bad acts, unjust oaths, curses and finally difficulties and sorrow. But God, who once freed the three boys from the path of the flames, is always with me and has freed me from these tribulations and converted them into sweetness, “for his mercy endures forever”. Assist me with your prayers so that I may struggle according to the law and indeed “fight the good fight” and that I may be worthy to fight until the end, finishing my course happily; if we do not see each other again in this life, in the future age, nonetheless, this will be our joy, when standing before the throne of the spotless Lamb, with one voice we sing his praises, exulting in the joy of eternal victory. Amen

On 24 November, 1960, Pope John XXIII established the Catholic hierarchy in Vietnam. There are about 5-7 million Catholics, about 6-7 percent of the population—all the fruits of martyrs’ blood.

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