September 12—Servant of God Thomas Frederick Price: Priest and Missionary

 

*

Until 1908, the United States Catholic Church was a missionary church, in other words, supervised by the Propagation of the Faith headquartered in the Vatican. Three years later, today’s saint-candidate, Fr. Price and three other men founded The Catholic Foreign Missionary Society of America, to spread the Good News to other people, notably in China. Today, Maryknoll consists of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, the Maryknoll Sisters, and the Maryknoll Lay Missioners. The Maryknoll Affiliates are men and women who do educational mission service and immersion experiences within the Maryknoll Movement. 

 Fr. Price was from North Carolina and met Fr. James Walsh of Boston in 1910, as both were trying to promote a missionary society. They presented their plans to the American bishops and traveled to Rome where Pope St. Pius X gave approval in 1911. The four Maryknoll priests then went to Hong Kong, China in 1918 and began their efforts in Yangjiang on the South China Coast. Fr. Price suffered from physical ailments and developed appendicitis in 1919, dying on the feast of the Most Holy Name of Mary, September 12, 1919. His body was exhumed and transferred to the cemetery at Maryknoll, New York. 

 Fr. Price had a great devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. He visited Lourdes, France and learned about the apparitions to St. Bernadette. He even renamed the location of the headquarters of the CFMSA from Sunset Hill to Mary’s Knoll, giving rise to the name Maryknoll Missioners. Our Blessed Mother guides us to her son, Jesus. She intercedes for us and gives us her motherly love and protection. Our Lord, Jesus gave her to us through his beloved disciple at the cross on Calvary when he said, “Woman, behold, your son” and “Behold, your mother” (Jn. 19:26-27). Let us pray for Fr. Price’s canonization.

*https://maryknollsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/mk-fr-thomas-price-adult-portrait-lores-scaled.jpg

August 19--Servant of God Nicholas Black Elk, Holy Man

*

John G. Neihardt wrote Black Elk Speaks as an account of the destruction of the Native American culture with the Massacre of Wounded Knee as the final battle of the Indian Wars. But there is more to his life than the ending of a time and culture. Black Elk was a boy of nine when he had a vision where he was visited by spirits, shown the sacred tree, and called to save his people. His vision became the core of Neihardt’s book, as well as his life up to Wounded Knee.

He came from a long line of medicine men. He participated in the Battle of the Little Bighorn and traveled to England with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show. He also fought at and survived Wounded Knee. That is where Black Elk Speaks ends with a later postscript showing Black Elk on top of Harney Peak, now named Black Elk Peak. There is no mention of how Black Elk became Nicholas Black Elk, a Catholic catechist.

Black Elk was baptized Nicholas in 1904 and was appointed a catechist on the Pine Ridge Reservation. As a catechist, he taught his people how Catholicism connects with the Lakota traditions and beliefs. He converted 400 people. At the end of his life, he wrote a book called The Sacred Pipe, whose purpose was stated: “It is my prayer that, through our sacred pipe, and through this book in which I shall explain what our pipe really is, peace may come to those peoples who can understand, and understanding which must be of the heart and not of the head alone. Then they will realize that we Indians know the One true God, and that we pray to Him continually.” His cause for canonization was opened in the Rapid City Diocese in 2017.

*https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Black_Elk.jpg

Unknown authorUnknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

September 10--Servants of God Pedro de Corpa and Companions, Priests, Religious, and Martyrs

Georgia has martyrs for the faith and for marriage. These martyrs were killed over 420 years ago in the missions of the Spanish Franciscans to the natives of Georgia. The five martyrs had been missionaries to the region for a few years and had been accepted by the natives, converting many, including the leader and the presupposed successor of one village. However, Juanillo, the nephew of the leader, was opposed by the missionaries. He was rebuked for marital infidelity, even though he was baptized. This offended Juanillo, who then planned and carried out the martyrdom of the five priests. The reasons for the killings, by one who had participated in it, was that they were “troublemaker[s], had forbidden the natives to have dealings with spirits, and had said that they should not have more than one wife.” All of the martyrs had been clubbed to death by Christian natives. The cause for their canonization was opened in 1984, with the positio, or the document/s used to promote the cause, presented in 1993.

We are called to share our faith by being disciples. Sometimes that means we are called to evangelize those who have already been baptized. We may also suffer at the hands of our fellow Catholics and Christians who support marital infidelity of various kinds, including divorce, adultery, fornication, same-sex, so-called, marriage, contraception, abortion, and so forth, in the name of “tolerance” or “diversity” or “legality” or “rights” or “happiness”. We may not be bludgeoned to death but shamed into silence and acquiescence. Keep in mind, silence implies acceptance. Be not afraid of the truth and joy and beauty of marital love. Jesus wasn’t, and neither were the Georgia martyrs.