Catholic Heroes . . . St. John Gabriel Perboyre (1802-1840)
By DEB PIROCH
“The blood of your martyrs has become the seed of a multitude of authentic disciples of Jesus. My heart overflows with wonder and gratitude to God for the generous witness given by a host of Bishops, priests, men and women religious, and lay people. And it seems that the time of trial, in some places, has not yet come to an end!” — Message to the Catholic Church in China, Pope John Paul II (1999).
China’s first canonized saint is French missionary St. John Perboyre. Of eight children he, and two of his brothers, as well as an uncle, ended their lives as members of the Congregation of the Mission founded by St. Vincent de Paul. Two of his sisters became nuns, as well. His order was dedicated to formation of the clergy and aiding the poor. He would do both in his short lifetime.
Born on Epiphany 1802, just after the end of the French Revolution, he came into the world at a time when the Church was greatly persecuted at home. The idea of suffering for the faith would not have seemed unique or strange in any way. He first experienced a call to the religious life, though, only when accompanying his brother to the seminary and staying with him awhile. His brother was sickly and in need of accompaniment at the start. Later ordained himself in 1826, John’s work in France continued another nine years, during which he also held various posts as professor, rector, and even assistant director of his congregation’s novitiate.
However, John Gabriel’s call since the age of 15, after hearing a sermon which set him on fire, was to be a missionary to the “heathen.” At this time China was most definitely mission territory, but it was very distant and also dangerous. Christianity was outlawed and many had died over the centuries there, trying to spread the Gospel.
Asking periodically for over a decade, he was finally granted permission to be a missionary but only after his younger brother — who had the same wish — died on the journey to China. His brother had been only 24. Arriving in Macao, on the southern coast, John Gabriel took 17 months to reach his destination. He was housed in the home of another martyr on his arrival. Over time he would go north to other towns, starting with Nanyang, in the area of Wuhan. The area known today as the birthplace of the COVID-19 virus housed hospitals even then.
It took him eight months to travel north, and on arrival if not earlier he started to learn Chinese, being able to converse after another six months. Two Chinese missionaries helped to introduce him and show him around, so he could safely operate.
Also, one account states he and other missionaries worked with the many orphans who were abandoned. They would feed and shelter them and teach them the faith. So as not to stick out like a sore thumb. Fr. Perboyre explained how he attempted to fit in, writing to his compatriots back home, “If you could see me now . . . you would see a very curious sight: my head shaved, a long pigtail and mustaches, stammering my new language, eating with chopsticks. They tell me that I don’t make a bad Chinaman. . . . May we be able thus to win all to Jesus Christ!”
Ministering to between 600-2,000 souls, Fr. Perboyre struggled. According to the book China’s Saints by Anthony E. Clark, he had a vision of Christ on the cross. He is reported to have heard Christ say, “What dost thou fear? Have I not died for thee? Put thy finger in my side and cease to fear thy damnation.” And after this experience, the priest had total peace. According to the Daughters of Charity, during his few years of ministry miracles were experienced in his faith community, too, especially through use of the Miraculous Medal.
Unfortunately, the year was 1939. Persecution increased like a wave homing in on the missionaries from the Chinese government, and the first Opium War — which England would win in three years — made Western faces even more foreign and less desirable in the Asian country.
Here accounts diverge but agree on one essential point, that being that the Chinese closed in on Fr. Perboyre. Butler’s Lives states he was with other religious when they had to suddenly disperse and hide, while China’s Saints states his church was invaded and after putting away the Sacred Species, hid in the woods while his church burned.
In any case, both accounts state that a neophyte or catechumen betrayed Fr. Perboyre for 30 taels. One immediately begins to find parallels to the last days of Christ. Christ, too, was betrayed by someone who knew Him for money, and turned Him over to the authorities who tortured and imprisoned Him. The Lazarist priest refused to do as he was commanded, namely to trample on the cross and reveal an account of other missionaries. He would not and maintained silence. His torture was beyond description as he was dragged before courts twenty times, each time refusing to comply, each time being tortured yet again.
One type of torture alone was being hung by his thumbs and hair from the rafters. Another was being struck — scourged — over one hundred times with a stick of bamboo. He was forced to kneel on glass, his feet were chained to blocks of wood at night to make it difficult and uncomfortable to move. The beating alone left his lower back an open sore. His face was branded with four characters in Chinese, meaning “teacher of a false religion.” At one point he was forced to wear his vestments, to mock his priesthood, only the dignity they imbued caused two persons to ask his absolution. But his poor body was so abused, death would have been a relief.
Indeed, at the end of the Opium Wars, the British demanded in the Treaty of Nanking that in the future all foreign missionaries must be turned over to them by the Chinese. The Chinese were not to deal in such barbaric ways with these poor martyrs again.
On September 11, a short time after having finally made it to the land he had dreamt of serving as a boy, Fr. Perboyre was executed along with several others, common criminals. He was first to watch them die. Then he was himself tied to a cross, and strangled. The executioner made false starts to torture him, and someone gave him a kick to the stomach to finish him off. He passed away from this Earth at the young age of 38. One of the miracles attributed to the saint is that a huge cross appeared in the skies on the occasion of his death.
He was buried beside the Lazarist martyr in whose house he first lodged on his arrival in China, Blessed Francis Regis Clet, and later his body was returned to France, where it rests next to the founder of the Vincentians, St. Vincent de Paul. His feast day is September 11.
Here is part of a prayer is attributed to him; let us pray for the souls suffering in China yet today:
O my Divine Savior,
Transform me into Yourself.
May my hands be the hands of Jesus.
Grant that every faculty of my body
May serve only to glorify You.
