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As pictured above, today's saint was martyred with 116 others of whom 96 were Vientamese, 11 Spaniards, and 10 French. Of these 8 were bishops, 50 priests, and 59 lay men and women. They were martyred over the course of a few years and were canonied together in 1988.
Sometimes we think that it was only in ancient times that believers laid down their lives as martyrs for the name of Jesus but today's saint -and his 116 friends - tell a different story. For a story of great courage and faith, click on Saint of the Day under LINKS on the sidebar.
It is said that the blood of martyrs is the seed of faith. To see how the seed planted by those whom we honor today bloomed, read this story of an heir to Vietnam's faithful believers.
It is remarkable how much some people have endured. The story of Fr. Joseph is quite inspiring. I have a one-a-day calendar of saints that a friend gave me about 10 years ago. I still read the saint of the day each day even though, e.g., Saturday, November24, might have been on a Wednesday the year I received the calendar. My calendar has today's saint as Andrew Trong and Vietnamese martyrs rather than Andrew Du Lac. I wonder if they are the same person.
ReplyDeleteAndrew Trong and Andrew Dung-Lac were not the same person. I just googled to find their individual stories. I should have used Google.com to begin with!
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