Sept 20 — Memorial of Saints Andrew Kim Taejon, Priest, and Paul Chong Hasang, and their Companions, Martyrs
For centuries, Korea was closed to all outside influences, and all contact with foreigners was forbidden. No missionaries went there. Nevertheless, a number of laymen sought to find out all that they could about the outside world, through the annual embassy to Peking. Some books about Christianity fell into their hands, and they were converted. Because of the secrecy involved, it is impossible to date the origin of Christianity in Korea with any precision: it may have started in the early 17th century, but the first known baptism is that of Ni-Seoung-Houn, who was baptized under the name of Peter when he visited Peking in 1784.
The first known martyrs are Paul Youn and James Kouen, who in 1791 refused to offer sacrifice on the death of their relatives. Over the next century, over ten thousand Korean Christians were executed, with great cruelty; and many others perished.
For most of this period the church in Korea had no priests and was an entirely lay phenomenon. In 1794 the first priest to visit Korea, a Chinese, found a community of 4,000 Catholics who had never seen a priest. He was executed in 1801. Two further Chinese priests, sent at the request of the Korean Church, had a similarly brief ministry. Some thirty years later, at the request of the Korean Catholics, Pope Leo XII established the Prefecture Apostolic of Korea, and a new missionary phase began. The first of these missionaries, a French priest from the Paris Foreign Mission Society, entered the country in 1836 and was beheaded three years later. Many others followed. Andrew Kim Taegǒn, the first Korean priest, was secretly trained in Macao, entered Korea in 1845 and was executed in 1846, together with his father. A lay apostle, St Paul Chong Hasang, and many others perished at the same time. A further major persecution occurred in 1866.
In all, 103 of the Korean martyrs are celebrated today: they are mostly lay men and women; some married, some not; some old, some young, some even children.
“The Korean Church is unique because it was founded entirely by laypeople. This fledgling Church, so young and yet so strong in faith, withstood wave after wave of fierce persecution. Thus, in less than a century, it could boast of 10,000 martyrs. The death of these many martyrs became the leaven of the Church and led to today’s splendid flowering of the Church in Korea. Even today their undying spirit sustains the Christians of the Church of Silence in the north of this tragically divided land.” – Pope John Paul II at the canonization of the Korean Martyrs, May 6, 1984.
Source: Universalis
Wis 3:1-9
Lk 9:23-26
They who trust in him will understand the truth, those who are faithful will live with him in love.
“Simple in Virtue, Steadfast in Duty” — that is the motto of my beloved alma mater. I have always loved this phrase and it was for me, a meaningful axiom to live by when, as a young girl, I strove to do well in my studies and excel in my competitive sports. As I grew older and got charmed by the bright lights of the world, it grew harder to keep things simple. Rather, it gets more challenging to keep ‘wants’ simple, and dutifully stick to the straight and narrow.
As we celebrate this memorial of the martyrs in Korea — Saints Andrew Kim Taejon, Paul Chong Hasang and Companions — I realise that the stories of these forefathers of the Catholic faith are so far from the glitzy world of K-pop and K-drama that bedazzle the world today. The intoxicating pop culture portrays a life of modern-day cushy and heady romantic stories, followed by millions of people. Instead, the martyrs we honour today were people who made treacherous journeys, got baptised under secrecy while risking torture and death, and fought to pass on the faith even clandestinely. They were also foreign missionaries who braved persecution to carry the faith into a closed-off land.
What made these ordinary folk so courageous and blindingly willing to give up their lives for God? Would I be able to do this if God asked this of me? I worry that my hesitations would be many. I lead a comfortable, modern life today and I encounter relatively minimal friction in my life. In short, perhaps my faith has grown lazy.
As I reflect on the seasons of my life, I recognise that my faith was tried and tested during the period of numerous challenges. Yet then, I found myself clinging ever tighter to God and sharpened in intensity to conform myself to His will for me.
As the first reading carefully points out:
The souls of the virtuous are in the hands of God, no torment shall ever touch them.
In the eyes of the unwise, they did appear to die, their going looked like a disaster…
but they are in peace…
If they experienced punishment as men see it, their hope was rich in immortality;
slight was their affliction, great will their blessings be.
God has put them to the test and proved them worthy to be with him…
They who trust in him will understand the truth,
those who are faithful will live with him in love;
for grace and mercy await those he has chosen. — Wisdom 3:1-9
How beautiful this promise is for those who may suffer much in this life or present moment! At the same time, what a timely reminder for us who begin to realise that too comfortable, smooth and unchallenged a life can sometimes be the cause of ruin for one’s soul. As in the gospel today, Jesus said, “If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it. What gain then, is it for a man to have won the whole world and to have lost or ruined his very self?” (Luke 9:23-25)
Indeed, my true treasures are stored in heaven. And Christ holds the key to the room He has prepared for me. As I reflect on the scriptures today and acknowledge the gift of earthly and eternal life that He has given me, am I willing to live simply in virtue and strive steadfast in duty — for His glory?
(Today’s OXYGEN by Debbie Loo)
Prayer: Help me Lord, to practise dying to my self in the various moments asked of me. Help me to look not at what it costs me in this life, but to remember what the eternal cost is for my life with you. Help me to continue living as an example of Christian love and duty for my child and family, so that I may in so doing, bring them to heaven.
Thanksgiving: Thank you God, for always giving us hope in the face of pain; eternal life in the face of death.
OXYGEN 
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