“This stranger, who was introduced clandestinely into the kingdom, spends his life in the study of things of the heart and in meditation on what is incomprehensible…(From the death sentence of Bishop Ignatius Delgado.)”

Continuing the saga of the martyrs of Tonkin, nearly a hundred years after the death of Blessed Peter Martyrs Sanz and companions, two more Dominicans bishops died for the faith . They were Bishop Ignatius Delgado and Bishop Dominic Henares. With them a tertiary catechist died, Francis Chien, and the group (beautified in 1900 by Pope Leo XIII) also includes a Spanish priest, Joseph Fernandez, Father Augustine Schoeffler of the Paris Foreign Mission Society, who was a Dominican Tertiary, and twenty-one native confraternity members.

Of the early years of these martyrs we know little. Both were born in Spain, Bishop Delgado in 1762 and Bishop Henares three years later. From the sentence of condemnation itself we learn that Bishop Delgado had labored for nearly fifty years in Tonkin, which argues that he must have been a resourceful man as well as a zealous one. In 1838 the two bishops and the catechist were captured, in a persecution recently stirred up by the mandarin. The prelates and a young priest had been hidden in the village of Kien-lao, and were accidentally betrayed by a little child who was cleverly questioned by a pagan teacher searching for the foreigners. Alarmed at the sudden activities, the captors of Bishop Delgado put him into a small cage which was locked around him, and then put into jail with criminals.

Communism had made us familiar with the type of questioning that Bishop Delgado had to face. A copy of his trial, which still existed a few years ago, showed that he answered truthfully and fearlessly where he himself was concerned, but that no amount of questioning or torture could make him reveal the whereabouts of his companions. A young priest in another place had taken to his heels when the alarm of the bishop’s arrest was heard, and was still at large. There was no proof that Bishop Henares had been caught, nor the catechists who worked with him. So Bishop Delgado, an old man of seventy six, endured the tortures rather than give any clue as to where they might be found.

The death sentence was passed on Bishop Delgado, and he was left in the open cage under the summer sun, to exist in misery until it should please the mandarin to kill him. Pagans jeered at him and threw waste in his face, and he was deprived of even the simplest necessities. Worn out by suffering but still silent as to his companions’ whereabouts, he died of dysentery before the mandarin was ready to behead him. The enraged solders cut off his head when they found that he had died, and threw the remains into a swift river. Fisherman promptly set about the dangerous business of rescuing the relics.

Bishop Henares was captured with a companion at the same time as Bishop Delgado. He had hidden himself in a boat, and the nervousness of the boatmen gave him away. Five hundred soldiers were detached to bring in the two “dangerous” criminals, the bishop and his catechist, Francis Chien. They too were questioned endlessly, and kept apart from Bishop Delgado. Two weeks after the death of the first bishop, the second was led out and beheaded in company with this catechist.

The relics of all three martyrs were recovered in part, and were honorably buried by the next Dominicans to come on the scene- Bishop Hermosilla and his companions, who would, as they knew, also be the next to die.

We have no information of the twenty-one members of the Confraternity of the Rosary who was honored with the three martyrs of 1838, nor about the Spanish Father Fernandez. Father Augustine Schoeffler of the Paris Foreign Mission Society should likewise hold a place of honor among Dominicans, as he was a Tertiary. Many of the records of these brave men were lost or deliberately destroyed, and many of them- we hope- may still be found in various neglected spots which war and trouble have caused to be overlooked.

Born: Spain: Bishop Ignatius Delgado (November 23, 1761 at Villafeliche, Spain), Dominic Henares (December 19, 1765 at Baena, Spain)

Died: July 12, 1838 of hunger and exposure in Vietnam (Ignatius Delgado), beheaded on June 25, 1838 in Vietnam (Dominic Henares, Francis Chien), Companions- various dates and unknown causes

Beatified: May 27, 1900 by Pope Leo XIII

The Reformation gained its foothold in the Netherlands in opposition to the Catholicism of the Spanish princes of the country–not primarily for religious, but rather for political reasons. Anti-Spanish and Calvinist soldiers banded together into lawless armies of pirates, and, unpaid and disillusioned, foraged for themselves in the seaports, looking for plunder.

Reproached by the clergy, they turned on the Church and one band of pirates led by the Gueux laid siege to the city of Gorkum, capturing it in June 26, 1572 after a struggle. For reprisal– because of the city’s determined defense–they gathered all members of the clergy in Gorkum into one miserable prison and set about taking revenge on the priests for their own grievances against the Spanish crown.

The priests were tortured, subjected to all kinds of indignities, and offered their freedom if they would abjure Catholic teaching on the Eucharist and the primacy of the pope. Angered by the endurance of the priests, the Calvinist increased their abuses. Some of the religious were very old and infirm, but one and all, even to an aged Augustinian who was so weak he could barely stand, they bore their martyrdom with patience and sweetness for ten terrible days.

They were repeatedly asked to deny the Real Presence, and just as repeatedly refused, which brought on more and more dreadful tortures. When they continued to refuse, despite a letter from Prince William of Orange ordering their release and protests from the magistrates of Gorkum, they were thrown half-naked into the hold of a ship on July 6, and taken to another city to be killed in the presence of a Protestant nobleman, Admiral Luney, a man noted for his hatred of Catholicism.

After being exhibited to the curious townspeople (who paid to see the spectacle) and subjected to every type of torture, the 19 priests and religious were hanged in an old barn at deserted Ruggen Monastery on the outskirts of Briel. Stripped of their habits and made, like their Master, “the reproach of men and the outcast of the people,” they benefited by their Christ-like sufferings and deaths. Their bodies, mutilated before or after death, were callously thrown into a ditch. The 19 martyrs included eleven Franciscans (called Recollects), two Premonstratensians, one Dominican, one canon regular of Saint Augustine, and four secular priests.

Two of those who died had led less than holy lives, but by their heroic constancy in the hour of trial blotted out the stains that might otherwise have kept them out of heaven. Sadly, there should have been 20 martyrs of Gorkum. One, who weakened and was released after he had denied the Real Presence, lived but 24 hours to enjoy his wretched freedom.

The other 19 gloriously went to heaven. The scene of the martyrdom soon became a place of pilgrimage, where all the Christian world reverenced the men who were so courageously obedient until death. Accounts of several miracles, performed by their intercession and relics, were used for their beatification and published by the Bollandists. Most of their relics are kept in the Franciscan church at Brussels to which they were secretly conveyed from Briel in 1616.

St. John’s companions were:

* Adrian Beanus, O. Praem.

* Adrian van Hilvarenbeek

* Fr. Andrew Wouters, OFM, was a priest at Heinot near Dortrecht. He led a scandalous life, but when the Calvinists tried to compel him to renounce the Catholic faith, he expiated his past by a brave confession, was imprisoned at Briel with the others and hanged.

* Fr. Antony van Hoornaer, OFM

* Fr. Antony van Weert, OFM

* Fr. Antony van Willehad, OFM, from Denmark

* Cornelius van Wyk (near Utrecht), OFM, was born at Dorestat near Utrecht. He took the Franciscan habit at Gorkum as a lay brother.

* Fr. Godefried of Mervel, OFM, was a painter and the custos of the Franciscan house at Gorkum.

* Fr. Godrey van Duynsen, native of Gorkum, was captured with Leonard Vechel and Nicholas Jannsen in Gorkum and sent to Briel, the Netherlands, where they were hanged. Previously, he had been the rector of a school in Paris.

James Lacops, O. Praem., was a native of Oudenarden, Flanders. He was a Norbertine at Middelburg and in 1566 apostatized, wrote, and preached against the Church. Then he repented, returned to his abbey, and was martyred by the Calvinists.

* Fr. Jerome Weerden, OFM, was born in Werden, the Netherlands, in 1522. He spent several years in Palestine as a Franciscan missionary. Jerome was a powerful preacher against Calvinism and at the time of his capture was the vicar of the friary of Gorkum under Saint Nicholas of Pieck.

* Fr. John van Hoornaer, OFM

* John van Oosterwyk, OSA, was a native of the Netherlands who joined the Augustinians at Briel. He was the director and confessor of a community of Augustinian nuns at Gorkum when the town was taken by the Calvinists.

* John of Cologne, OP, was a Dominican religious of his convent in Cologne, Germany who performed the duties of a parish priest in Horner, the Netherlands. When he heard of the plight of the poor priests captured in Gorkum, he left the relative safety of his parish and entered Gorkum in disguise to render whatever assistance he could. Several times he entered the city to dispense the sacraments, and to bring consolation to the priests who were being cruelly tortured. Eventually, he also was taken prisoner and subjected to torture.

* Leonard Vechel (Veehel, Wegel, Wichel), the elder pastor at Gorkum, was born in Bois-le-Duc, Holland. He studied in Louvain, where he earned a great reputation in his theological studies under the celebrated Ruard Tapper, was ordained, and became a parish priest at Gorkum known for his uncommon zeal, piety, eloquence, and learning. He had a remarkable ability to solve difficult problems. He tenderly cared for the poor, especially those that were sick, giving of himself as well as of his substance. He reproved vice without respect of persons, but his meekness and patience disarmed many who had been long deaf to remonstrations. He was in active opposition to Calvinism. He and his assistant Nicholas Jannsen Poppel of Welde, Belgium, were among those seized by a Calvinist mob at Gorkum.

* Fr. Nicholas Janssen Poppel (van Heeze), OFM, a native of Heeze, Brabant, from which he derived the name Nicasius van Heeze, was an associate pastor to Vechel. He was captured with his pastor, Leonard Vechel, and Godrey van Duynsen.

* Fr. Nicholas Pieck–Nicholas was the guardian of the Observant Franciscan house at Gorkum. This eminent, 38-year-old preacher was a native of the Netherlands who studied at Louvain and made missionary activities among the Calvinists his life’s work. He had an intense zeal for holy poverty and mortification, yet his constant cheerfulness rendered piety and penance itself amiable. He is known for repeating, “We must always serve God with cheerfulness.” Fr. Pieck had often expressed an earnest desire for martyrdom, but considered himself unworthy for that honor. He and four other priests were among the first seized when Calvinist forces opposed to the Spanish rule seized the town in June.

* Peter of Assche, OFM, from near Brussels, Belgium, was a Franciscan lay brother at Gorkum.

* Fr. Theodore van der Eem, OFM, from Amersfoort.

Born: Born in Germany in the 16th century

Died: burned, beaten, hanged and mutilated in 1572 at Gorkum, Holland

Canonized: Pope Pius IX canonized them in 1867.

Representation: elevating the Eucharist as he wears a rope around his neck

Nicholas Boccasini was born into a poor family of which we know little else, though there are several different traditions concerning it. One claims that his father was a poor shepherd. Another that he was an impoverished nobleman. Whichever he was, he died when Nicholas was very small, and the little boy was put in the care of an uncle, a priest at Treviso.

The child proved to be very intelligent, so his uncle had him trained in Latin and other clerical subjects. When Nicholas was ten, his uncle got him a position as tutor to some noble children. He followed this vocation until he was old enough to enter the Dominican community at Venice in 1254. Here, and in various parts of Italy, Nicholas spent the next 14 years, completing his education. It is quite probable that he had Saint Thomas Aquinas for one of his teachers.

Nicholas was pre-eminently a teacher at Venice and Bologna. He did his work well according to several sources, including a testimonial from Saint Antoninus, who said that he had “a vast store of knowledge, a prodigious memory, a penetrating genius, and (that) everything about him endeared him to all.” In 1295, he received the degree of master of theology.

The administrative career of Nicholas Boccasini began with his election as prior general of Lombardy and then as the ninth master general of the Order of Preachers in 1296. His work in this office came to the notice of the pope, who, after Nicholas had completed a delicate piece of diplomacy in Flanders, appointed him cardinal in 1298.

The Dominicans hurried to Rome to protest that he should not be given the dignity of a cardinal, only to receive from the pope the mystifying prophecy that God had reserved an even heavier burden for Nicholas. As papal legate Nicholas traveled to Hungary to try to settle a civil war there.

Boniface VIII did not always agree with the man he had appointed cardinal-bishop of Ostia and dean of the sacred college. But they respected one another, and in the tragic affair that was shaping up with Philip the Fair of France, Cardinal Boccasini was to be one of only two cardinals who defended the Holy Father, even to the point of offering his life.

Philip the Fair, like several other monarchs, discovered that his interests clashed with those of the papacy. His action was particularly odious in an age when the papal power had not yet been separated completely from temporal concerns.

The French monarch, who bitterly hated Boniface, besieged the pope in the Castle of Anagni, where he had taken refuge, and demanded that he resign the papacy. His soldiers even broke into the house and were met by the pope, dressed in full pontifical vestments and attended by two cardinals, one of whom was Cardinal Boccasini. For a short time it looked as though the soldiers, led by Philip’s councilor William Nogaret, might kill all three of them, but they refrained from such a terrible crime and finally withdrew after Nicholas rallied the papal forces and rescued Boniface from Anagni.

Cardinal Boccasini set about the difficult task of swinging public opinion to the favor of the pope. Successful at this, he stood sorrowfully by when the pontiff died, broken-hearted by his treatment at the hands of the French soldiers. On October 22, 1303, at the conclave following the death of Boniface, the prophesied burden fell upon the shoulders of the cardinal-bishop of Ostia, who took the name Benedict XI.

The reign of Benedict XI was too short to give him time to work out any of his excellent plans for settling the troubles of the Church. Most of his reign was taken up with undoing the damage done by Philip the Fair. He lifted the interdict on the French people that had been laid down by his predecessor and made an uneasy peace with Philip. He worked to reconcile warring parties in Europe and the Church and to increase spirituality. His reign, short though it was, was noted for its leniency and kindness.

There are few personal anecdotes regarding Benedict, but at least one worth telling. Once, during his pontificate, his mother came to the papal court to see him. The court attendants decided that she was too poorly dressed to appear in the presence of the Holy Father, so they dressed her up in unaccustomed finery before allowing her to see her son. Benedict, sensing what had happened, told them he did not recognize this wealthy woman, and he asked them where was the little widow, pious and poorly dressed, whom he loved so dearly.

Benedict XI died suddenly in 1304. He had continued to the end with his religious observances and penances. Some people believed that he had been poisoned, but there has never been any evidence that this was the case. Many miracles were performed at his tomb, and there were several cures even before his burial.

Born: Born in Treviso, Italy, 1240

Papal Ascension: 1303

Died: died in Perugia, Italy, April 25, 1304

Beatified: beatified by Pope Clement XII in 1736

Representation: In art, Pope Benedict wears a Dominican habit and papal tiara, while holding the keys. He is venerated in Perugia.

Antony was born into the nobility, the family of the Marquis della Chiesa, and a collateral ancestor of Pope Benedict XV. He was well educated. Showing a taste early in life for he things of God, he grew up with the hope of becoming a religious. His father, who was a man of some importance, opposed this wish. Not until Antony was 22 was he able to make the break with his family and enter the monastery at Vercelli.

Here he distinguished himself for both sanctity and learning. Being a good preacher, he was for some years the companion of Saint Bernardine of Siena, in his missionary journeys through Italy. Antony was prior at the friaries of Como, Savona, Florence, and Bologna.

Antony gives us a picture of one who followed the Dominican life perfectly, managing, most of the time, to escape public notice. There is in his life very little of the glamorous or the unusual. He kept the rule, was a good superior, and a just administrator. Shunning applause, he was always serene.

The legends mention that he was particularly devoted to Our Lady, which is something one takes for granted in a Dominican, and that he conversed with her, in ecstasy, several times. He had the gift of reading hearts and was a sought-after director of souls. He also healed many sick people with his blessing. However, if any miracles are ordinary ones, these may be so described; they could be given as typical of most of early Dominicans.

At one time, Antony was on a ship that was captured by pirates, but at his prayer, the pirates spared the passengers and brought them safely to land. One of the very few things of unusual nature that in Antony’s life is a legend told of him when he was prior of Savona. It makes a lovely ghost story, and it also provides food for thought.

According to the story, Antony was praying one night in the church. Disturbed by the sound of horses hooves clattering on the flagstones outside, he went to see who could possibly be there at such a late hour. There were several horsemen, all mounted on black horses. He addressed them, but received no answer. Thinking that they might be foreigners, he tried several languages, and still there was no response.

Aware, then, that something was wrong, he commanded them in the name of the Lord to tell him who they were and where they were going. They said that they were devils, and that they were on their way to meet the soul of a dying sinner, a usurer, and escort him to hell. “I will pray for him,” said Antony. The demons laughed and told him he was too late. “Then at least come back and tell me whether you succeed or not,” said the prior.

A short while later, the group returned, and they had succeeded. They held the unhappy usurer captive, and, while the prior watched in horror, they bore him off. The man was screaming. The next day, the usurer’s relatives came to arrange an elaborate funeral. “You would do much better to have Masses said for yourselves and other poor sinners,” he said.

Antony died at Como and was buried there in the Dominican church Miracles at his tomb led to his beatification.

Born: in San Germano, near Vercelli, the Piedmont, Italy, in 1395;

Died: Como, Italy, January 22, 1459;

Beatified: 1819 by Pope Pius VII

Peter of Tarentaise was barely 10 years old when he was admitted to the Dominican Order by Blessed Jordan of Saxony as a boy-novice and sent to Paris to study. Like Saint Thomas Aquinas, Blessed Ambrose of Siena, and other luminaries of the 13th century, he fell under the masterly tutelage of Saint Albert the Great.

He received his master’s degree in theology in 1259, then he taught for some years in Paris, where he contributed a great deal to the order’s reputation for learning. He wrote a number of commentaries on Scripture and the Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, but he devoted most of his time to the classroom. He soon became famous as a preacher and theologian, and in 1259, with a committee including his friend Thomas Aquinas, composed a plan of study that is still the basis of Dominican teaching.

At age 37, Peter began the long years of responsibility in the various offices he was to hold in his lifetime as prior provincial of France. He visited on foot all Dominican houses under his care, and was then sent to Paris to replace Thomas Aquinas at the University of Paris. Twice provincial, he was chosen archbishop of Lyons in 1272 and administered the affairs of the diocese for some time, though he was never actually consecrated for that see.

The next year Peter was appointed cardinal-archbishop of Ostia, Italy, while still administering the see of Lyons. With the great Franciscan, Saint Bonaventure, assumed much of the labor of the Council of Lyons to which Saint Thomas was hastening at the time of his death. To the problems of clerical reform and the healing of the Greek schism the two gifted friars devoted their finest talents. Before the council was over, Bonaventure died, and Peter of Tarentaise preached the funeral panegyric.

In January 1276, Peter was with Blessed Pope Gregory X when the latter died at Arezzo. The conclave was held in the following month. On January 21, 1276, Peter of Tarentaise received every vote except his own. With a sad heart, he left the seclusion of his religious home to ascend the Fisherman’s Throne as Pope Innocent V.

The reign of the new pope, which promised so much to a harassed people, was to be very brief. But, imbued with the spirit of the early apostles, he crowded a lifetime into the short space given him.

He instigated a new crusade against the Saracens and began reforms in the matter of regular observance. He actually succeeded in solving many of the questions of the Greek schism and in establishing a short-lived truce. He struggled to reconcile the Guelphs and Ghibellines, restored peace between Pisa and Lucca, and acted as mediator between Rudolph of Hapsburg and Charles of Anjou. He restored the custom of personally assisting at choral functions with the canons of the Lateran, and he inspired all with the love that animated his heart.

Had the measures begun by Innocent V had time to be fully realized, he might have accomplished great good for the Church; he did at least open the way for those who were to follow him. Death stopped the hand of the zealous pope when he had reigned only five months. Like his friends Saint Thomas and Saint Bonaventure, he was untouched by the honors and dignity with which he had been favored, and death found him exactly what he had been for more than 40 years–a simple, humble friar.

Born: 1245 at Tarentaise, Burgundy, France as Petrus a Tarentasia

Papal Ascension: 1276

Died: 1277 at Rome of natural causes

Beatified: cult was confirmed by Leo XIII in 1898

 

Osanna Andreassi was the daughter of the wealthy patrician Andreasio. She experienced visions from her early childhood, but kept the experiences to herself. At the age of six, she saw the Child Jesus carrying a cross and wearing a crown of thorns. He told her that He has a special love of children and purity. She was so impressed, as we all would be, that she immediately consecrated her entire life to God.

Osanna begged her father to allow her to learn to read so that she might be able to pray the Divine Office. He refused her request because it was a waste for a woman who was expected simply to raise a family. Osanna couldn’t explain why she wanted to learn; she couldn’t reveal her plans to him. When she was 14 and knew that he was arranging a marriage for her, she furtively went to the Dominican church and received the habit of its tertiaries. When she appeared at home in her religious garb, she explained that she had made a vow and must wear it until she had fulfilled her promise.

Now, this should not be understood as condoning deceit, but it served God’s purpose. Her pious father accepted her explanation for a time. As the months passed he began to suspect what had happened. He had already refused to give her permission to enter the convent, and he was displeased that she should try to live as a tertiary in his own home. Eventually, his father’s heart melted and he allowed Osanna to continue her routine of prayer, penance, and charity for the rest of her life. She was not professed until a few months before her death forty-two years later.

After the early death of both her parents, Osanna spent her fortune in the service of the poor. Her house became a center for people to discuss spiritual matters, for the needy and the sick, for the wealthy and the noble.

It is said that like Saint Catherine, she miraculously learned to read. One day she saw a piece of paper with two words and said, “Those words are ‘Jesus’ and ‘Mary.'” From that time she could read anything pertaining to spiritual matters. By the same sort of favor, she also learned to write.

At age 28 (1477), Osanna received the mark of the wound in Jesus’ side, caused by a long nail. For the next year various of the sacred wounds would appear, including the crown of thorns. Others saw them only on Wednesdays, Fridays, and during Holy Week, but it appears that they were visible to her and caused both pain and joy.

At this time Osanna felt the need for a spiritual director and prayed for one with wisdom, patience, and understanding. She found him during Mass when an interior voice said to her, “That’s the one you need, the one who is saying Mass.” Osanna thought he was too young, but, upon meeting him in the confessional a few days later, all doubts were erased.

Before her death, the soul of Blessed Columba of Rieti, another Dominican tertiary, appeared to her and told Osanna to prepare for death.

Born: January 17, 1449 at Mantua, Italy

Died: 1505 of natural causes

Beatified: November 24, 1694 Pope Innocent XII (cultus confirmed)

Representation: In art, Osanna is a Dominican tertiary wearing a crown of thorns, surrounded by rays of light (not the halo of a saint), a lily, a broken heart with a crucifix springing from it, the devil under her feet, two angels (one with a lily, one with a cross). This is similar to the image of Saint Catherine of Siena, who has a halo. Osanna is the patroness of school girls.