Martyrdom
On February 5, 1597, twenty-six Christians – four Spaniards, one Mexican, one Indian, all Franciscan missionaries, three Japanese Jesuits and seventeen Japanese laymen including three young boys, who were all members of the Third Order of St. Francis – were executed by crucifixion in Nagasaki on the orders of Hideyoshi Toyotomi. These individuals were raised on crosses and then pierced through with spears.
Persecution continued sporadically, breaking out again in 1613 and 1630. On September 10, 1632, 55 Christians were martyred in Nagasaki in what became known as the Great Genna Martyrdom. At this time Catholicism was officially outlawed. The Church remained without clergy and theological teaching disintegrated until the arrival of Western missionaries in the nineteenth century.
While there were many more martyrs, the first martyrs came to be especially revered, the most celebrated of which was Paul Miki. The Martyrs of Japan were canonized by the Roman Catholic Church on June 8, 1862 by Blessed Pius IX, and are listed on the calendar as Sts. Paul Miki and his Companions, commemorated on February 6, February 5, the date of their death, being the feast of Saint Agatha. They were included in the General Roman Calendar for the first time in 1969; accordingly those who observe the universal versions of earlier calendars, such as the General Roman Calendar of 1962, the General Roman Calendar of Pope Pius XII, the General Roman Calendar as in 1954 and, of course, the Tridentine Calendar, in which these saints do not appear, give them no liturgical veneration. They are, however, provided with their own Mass texts (Collect, Secret and Postcommunion) under February 13 - the first Feria after the date of their martyrdom - in the pro aliquibus locis section of missals used by those observing the General Roman Calendar of 1962.
Drawn from the oral histories of Japanese Catholic communities, Shusaku Endo's acclaimed novel Silence provides detailed accounts of the persecution of Christian communities and the suppression of the Church.
Read more about this topic: Twenty-six Martyrs Of Japan
Famous quotes containing the word martyrdom:
“Every man has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a right to knock him down for it. Martyrdom is the test.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
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