The Martyrs of Uganda

Blessed Martyrs of Uganda, Pray for us to God!

In  the late 1800s Christian missionaries (first Anglican in 1877 and then Roman Catholic in 1879) began to preach the Gospel in Buganda (now part of Uganda). The people received the Christian message very enthusiastically and many were baptized. The King of Buganda,m Mutesa at first received the missionaries warmly and even allowed the Christians to preach at court.  However to protect his throne and to balance the political and social influence of the missionaries, he also welcomed Arab traders who preached Islam.

The Roman Catholic White Father missionaries had to walk the diplomatic tight rope as they say, since the King's favour shifted from one religious group or the other. This was a time before Christians had an appreciation of ecumenical principles and the Anglicans were often in competition with the Catholics and both Christian groups were in competition with Muslim missionaries.

After the death of Mutesa his son Mwanga ascended the Bugandan throne. While at first he was warm to the Christians, he later became hostile to them. Mwanga became sold to the idea that it was treasonous to give allegiance to the Christian God. An Anglican bishop James Hannington was consecrated as a missionary bishop for Equatorial Eastern Africa. When he went to the mission areas in Buganda, the King had him killed. The bishop is the Protomartyr of the Christian missions. His last words to his executioners are "Tell Mwanga that I have purchased the road to Buganda with my blood!"

However the King's sexual tastes included homosexual sex with the young pages in his court. The boys refused to bend to his will.

The chief steward at court Joseph Mukasa , who was a Catholic rebuked the King for the murder and for that he was also stabbed and burned to death as an example to all. He became the first of the Catholic martyrs. Mukasa was able to teach the boys the Christian teaching on homosexual acts and for the boys to resist and keep away from Mwanga's whims. Charles Lwanga took over him in looking after these boys.

One of the boys resisted Mwanga's advances and he too was martyred. Enraged, he ordered the execution of all his pages in court, all of whom are Christian, Anglican and Roman Catholic as well as catechumens.

The King gave the boys a choice whether to renounce their faith or not. Mwanga commanded all who pray (the Lord's Prayer) to his left and those who don't to his right. All the boys went to the left and they were led to the place of execution. They were bound with reeds and faggots and these were lit. The boys included the eldest Charles Lwanga and the youngest Kzito was only 14. While on the way they prayed the Lord's Prayer and recited their catechism, Anglicans and Roman Catholics, cheerful on the road to Eternal Life. It was Ascension Day.

Pope Paul VI canonized the Roman Catholic martyrs on 18 October 1964. However the Pope also recognized the martyrdom of the Anglican boys in his homily during the canonization Mass by saying

"And the others are worthy of mention also, who, professing the Anglican religious customs, were afflicted with death for the name of Christ."


The martyrdom of the Ugandan boys became the seed for the rapid growth of Christianity in Uganda. But it was the will of God that many yet will shed their blood for the Gospel in this land. In the 20th Century, the most notable of them was the Anglican Archbishop of Uganda, Janani Luwum,a staunch defender of human rights,  who in 1977 was ordered killed by Idi Amin. It is said that as Abp Luwum was to say the Lord's Prayer, Amin enraged, shot him.


The Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion commemorates the Martyrs on their feast day of June 3. 


Oremus


O God, by whose providence the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church: Grant that we who remember before thee the blessed martyrs of Uganda, may, like them, be steadfast in our faith in Jesus Christ, to whom they gave obedience even unto death, and by their sacrifice brought forth a plentiful harvest; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever, AMEN. 

A collect for Blessed Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II and Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Robert Runcie bless the congregation at Canterbury Cathedral in 1982

From Father Zulhsdorf's blog the Latin collect for John Paul II

Deus, dives in misericordia,
qui beatum Ioannem Paulum, papam,
universae Ecclesiae tuae praeesse voluisti,
praesta, quaesumus, ut, eius institutis edocti,
corda nostra salutiferae gratiae Christi,
unius redemptoris hominis, fidenter aperiamus.

Which he translated into English as

O God, who are rich in mercy
and who willed that the Blessed John Paul II
should preside as Pope over your universal Church,
grant, we pray, that instructed by his teaching,
we may open our hearts to the saving grace of Christ,
the sole Redeemer of mankind.
Who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit.....


Which we could "Cranmerize" as

O God, thou art rich in mercy
and who hast willed that the Blessed  Pope John Paul II
should preside as Pope over thy universal Church.
grant and we beseech thee, that edified by his teaching
we may open our hearts to the saving grace of Christ,
the only Redeemer of men
Who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, now and fore ever more, Amen.

Saint Valentine's Day

Many people in the English speaking world are not aware that our present celebration of Valentine's day and its relationship with romantic and erotic love is actually due to Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Parliament of Birds" also known with the older title "The Parliament of Fowls"

Chaucer is the first writer in literature to make a link between the martyr Valentine and marriage. He really "canonized" Valentine as the Patron Saint of Lovers! Here is a modern English translation of Chaucer's love poem.

And here is the famous line

"For this was on Saint Valentine’s day,

When every fowl comes there his mate to take,

Of every species that men know, I say,"

From then on, Valentine was forever linked with Lovers.

But who is St Valentine? A Buddhist friend of mine has been enamored by the story of Valentine. She has done some reading and she told me that there are actually at least three Valentines and at most 14, all martyred for the Christian faith during Roman times. Traditionally the liturgical color for martyrs is red and so is for Valentine's day.

The Roman Church no longer has Valentine in its post 1969 calendar since the Church isn't sure of who among the 14 is to be commemorated. However there are three St Valentines we know some information about. One is the presbyter Valentine, another is a Bishop Valentine whose see is now in Terni, Italy and a soldier named Valentine who was beheaded in north Africa. These three Valentines were commemorated on Feb 14. While the  Greek Church commemorates the Valentines on July 30, Greeks often name their children as Valentine or Valentina if they were born on Feb 14!

The Anglican Communion still follows the older Roman Calendar and commemorates any of the 3 Valentines on Feb 14. The Roman Catholic Church never removed Valentine from the martyrology and thus lovers can still ask his intercession. However the feast is no longer in the general calendar but are on local calendars, especially in Italy.

 

Here is a collect for St Valentine as said by some Anglicans

"Most Gracious Heavenly Father, You gave Saint Valentine the courage to witness to the gospel of Christ, even to the point of giving his life for it. Help us to endure all suffering for love of you, and to seek you with all our hearts; for you alone are the source of life and love. Grant that we may have the courage and love to be strong witnesses of your truth to our friends and family and to the whole world. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen."
 

In the Philippines, this saint's feast day has been so commercialized and worse objectifies people as either the dated or the dateless or just focuses on sex! Well of course some people have found true love and many are still searching for it. The truth of St Valentine's Day is none of us isn't loved! We are all challenged to return this love. And in the case of any of the 14 Valentines, they returned this love with their lives.

So All ye Holy 14 Valentines, pray for us to God!

The English and Welsh Martyrs , Mass at Westminster Cathedral, Tyburn Tree

It was 15 years ago this week when after enduring a sleepless, 16 hour bumpy flight from Manila via Hong Kong to Heathrow, I checked in a budget hotel near Victoria Station, London. Hungry and a bit disorientated so early in the morning, I asked the hotel concierge where the horrors! nearest McDonald's was. The woman at the desk told me in a somewhat Cockney accent to walk along Victoria Street and on my right at the corner of the piazza, is a Mc Donalds. Well the piazza did not just reveal a McDonald's but the magnificent brick pile called Westminster Cathedral. So I went for a peek through the cathedral doors.

I was just in time for the 7:00 AM Mass. And I reckoned it would be quite rude to leave so I attended the service. The saints that were being commemorated were the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales, for it was their October 25 feast day. The officiating priest was Fr Alan Hopes, who I found out in Wikipedia became a bishop and now will likely be the first Bishop of the Anglican Ordinariate in England. Bishop Hopes was an Anglican priest who joined the Catholic Church in 1992, just as the Church of England authorized the ordination of women as priests.

That morning Mass was memorable since it was my first Latin Mass! Fr Hopes sang the Latin parts of the Novus Ordo Mass in a way that your soul will be lifted up to heaven and there was the excellent choir to sing too. There were a handful of worshipers at that early hour. Some were from Africa, North America,Latin America, Asia, two Filipinos who if I remember were sailors on shore leave and some Australians. London is such a cosmopolitan city that a Catholic service is made really Catholic since worshipers come from all over the world.

Even if  What I remember about Fr Hopes' homily is the fact that the 40 Martyrs came from all walks of life. There were the unlettered, the womenfolk, the priests, nuns, brothers and all sorts of religious, tradesmen like Nicholas Owen, the short man who made the priestholes, men of letters like Robert Southwell, and of course the nobility. The most famous of these martyrs is Edmund Campion, who probably was the most eloquent of them all. Campion was offered all honours and even a bishopric by the Queen herself, if he would just attend Anglican services. Though Campion was able to Brag, the rest lived their lives as ordinarily as possible until God brought them to the spot where they have to make that choice! The complete list of all the English and Welsh Reformation martyrs are here.

My favourite  among the English and Welsh martyrs aside from Thomas More, Edmund Campion and John Fisher is none but Margaret Clitherow, the Pearl of York. Her home has become a site of pilgrimage in the Shambles at York.

Fr Hopes mentioned the "Tyburn Tree" which at first I thought was a tree planted to commemorate the martyrs. The next day I took the bus and stepped off at Marble Arch, walked to Tyburn and there was the "tree" which to my horror is not the one with leafy branches but the gallows by which the martrys were killed. Nearby is the Tyburn Convent which commemorates the site.

Not only Catholic and Protestant martyrs died here. (Protestants died too for their convictions) All sorts of criminals and political prisoners did. Tyburn thus has many meanings for us.

The English and Welsh martrys were ordinary men and women. Some of them had wealth and privilege, learning and eloquence, and many had none of those. But God brought them to the spot (right at the foot of the Tree, where the Queen's agents were authorized to set them free if they conformed to the Anglican settlement) where they had to choose following Him in exchange for their lives. It was and still is not an easy choice to make. Today we are unlikely to be brought to Tyburn and we can't choose to go to Tyburn but  God may bring us there.

Most likely we will be brought to smaller and unpretentious Tyburn Trees where we are not asked to give our lives but our positions, career opportunities, job and financial securities and possibilities for advancement in society if not for accumulation of wealth. The only thing to do  is to look  the other way. But this means too to conform to the ways of the world, as they say. And doing that is easy. What then would be our choice?

The martyrs were able to make their choice not on their power or wit alone but by God's grace. We pray for that grace. Not all the English Catholics were given the choice, many lived faithful lives and died peacefully. But still they  had that grace.

The first Filipino saints were laymen who lived during the same historical period of the English Reformation. St Lorenzo Ruiz was brought to a Japanese version of the Tree (which the Japanese probably copied from the Europeans) and Blessed Pedro Calungson was cut down by a machete. They could have escaped but made that Choice!

We are not going to ask the intercession of the 40 Martyrs, St Lorenzo Ruiz and Bld Pedro Calungsod for God to bring us to make that choice, but to give as grace so we can live our lives as better Christians. And just for that reason, we have to close the book of the Reformation. The Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church venerates the memory of these English and Welsh Martyrs.

How many lives to give? St Lorenzo Ruiz of Manila and the Forty Martrys of England and Wales

I am proposing that the Anglican Use group in the Philippines have for one of its patrons St Lorenzo Ruiz of Manila. St Lorenzo Ruiz was a layman, married,a catechist and an acolyte. He served the Parish of the Most Holy Rosary in Binondo, Manila but was accused of killing a Spaniard. Thus he set out with Dominican missionaries to Japan in 1636 to escape these accusations. St Lorenzo is the patron saint of Filipinos overseas.

St Lorenzo and the 40 English and Welsh martyrs lived in the same century long period of the Reformation and the counter Reformation which impelled the Catholic Church to go on evangelizing Asia and the Americas. This was of course under the patronage of the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs. St Lorenzo reached Japan with his companions but was immediately arrested for Japan by then banned Catholic Christianity and ended the "Christian Century" of Japan. Adherence to Christianity was treasonous.

 The 40 Martyrs lived in a time when Catholicism was banned and adherence to the faith was treason. The Reformation almost ended the millennium long history of the Catholic Church in England.

In a sense Japan and England were in the same boat. They were advanced societies with  magnificent cultures and viewed Catholicism as a threat to their existence. The Catholics were made to suffer the torture of the rack, quartering and being hung.

St Lorenzo Ruiz and some of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales when brought to the site of martyrdom  said almost the same thing.

St Lorenzo of Manila: "If I had a thousand lives, all of them I offer to Him"

St Anne Line of England:  "I am condemned to die for harbouring a Catholic priest and so far I am from repenting for having so done, that I wish, with all my soul, that where I have entertained one, I could have entertained a thousand"

St Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel (upon being offered by Queen Elizabeth I that for him to attend Anglican services he will regain his freedom):"Tell Her Majesty, if my religion be the cause for which I suffer, sorry I am that I have but one life to lose."

These martyrs were did not hesitate to give their lives even for a thousand times. Thus they continue to inspire.

On "viruses" and my experience with a nasty one, memorable Septembers

The monsoon  or rainy season in the Philippines is a public health concern for the Department of Health, aside from the usual colds and flu that people catch, they especially the young , may catch nastier viral diseases such as dengue. The hospitals and clinics have recorded 54,000 cases of dengue as of this writing and 454 deaths have been recorded.

Dengue is  the major public health concern now. The worst hit regions are Western Visayas and the Cordilleras. The mountainous Cordilleras were once considered unlikely dengue hotspots since the mosquito vector is intolerant of cool climates. But with a warming and wetter climate, even the Cordilleras are no longer immune. The problem is that we have no vaccine against dengue or even a cure. Doctors can offer only what they call "supportive therapy". I know this from first hand experience since 9 years ago on this day, I was rushed to St Luke's Hospital in Cathedral Heights, Quezon City with a bad case of dengue that went from bad to worse. It was so bad that my prognosis was poor. I thought that I was about to "kick the bucket" that I asked for a priest. The Episcopal chaplain ministered to me. I did not get his name. The next day, I was much weaker, and the Roman Catholic chaplain came and gave viaticum. In the afternoon an ex student of mine who was a Jesuit seminarian came and said the prayers. He asked the intercession of the Virgin of Piat and he asked me to ask the intercession of the saint that first crossed my mind. And that saint was John Henry Newman! The seminarian left me with an apple and he went back to the Ateneo in the rain.

And the next day, I was up and about, walking! The doctors were amazed. The scientist that I am hesitated  to proclaim it was a miracle.

When life seems to ebb, we then acutely realize that we are at the mercy of God. [Of course when we are hale and strong and can do it, all we are at God's mercy but we don't realize it] What is the meaning of all that we have and done? I'd say not much without that meaning in God. I stayed in the hospital for more than a week and on September 11,2001 the world changed. I was in hospital still about three days before final discharge when I couldn't believe what just happened live on CNN. Even the doctors with me can't believe it too.

Septembers are memorable for me. One for that nasty viral episode, second for typhoon Ondoy by which all my expensive hi tech gadgets went swimming to techno-heaven and of course the Nativity of the Virgin. These things are somewhat related. We have to have God a go with our lives like what the Virgin did.

And writing about viruses, I can't help but recall Rev Staunton's "pan-Protestant virus" infecting Anglicanism. Rev Staunton was discouraged by events so he writes this. But an Episcopal priest told me that there is also an "Anglican virus" infecting Roman Catholics, Methodists, Baptists, Orthodox, even Atheists etc. What does this all mean?

Maybe God thinks that a viral infection while bad for the body, is good for the soul!

And BTW, this September will be memorable too for the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Britain to beatify John Henry Cardinal Newman. Remember he was the saint that first crossed my mind as I prepared to meet my Maker?

I did send an email to the Oratory in London telling the Fathers there of my tale at St Lukes. I got an automated reply. But that matters not.  Of course my tale is not as that miraculous as the permanent deacon who upon asking Newman's intercession got healed of a disease for which he had no chance of survival. (people regularly pull out of dengue!) But Newman to me brought my prayers to God.  That is all that matters really!