Sts. Andrew Dung-Lac and Companions

On November 24 the Church honors Sts. Andrew Dũng-Lạc and his 116 companions — the 117 Vietnamese martyrs canonized by Pope John Paul II on June 19, 1988. They were killed between 1745 and 1862, in the persecutions carried out by the Nguyen dynasty against a Church that — as in Korea — had grown from lay initiative rather than foreign missionary enterprise. Andrew Dũng-Lạc (1795-1839), a diocesan priest beheaded at Hanoi, was chosen as the representative head of the group. The 117 include 8 bishops, 50 priests, and 59 laypeople — among them a 9-year-old child.

The Vietnamese Church is one of the great stories of Catholic resilience. From the arrival of the first Jesuit missionaries in the 17th century, through the centuries of prohibition and execution, the faith grew until by the 20th century Vietnam had the largest Catholic population in Southeast Asia. The memorial, extended to the universal Church in 2007, honors all 117 canonized martyrs and, through them, the tens of thousands of Vietnamese Catholics who suffered for the faith across three centuries. The national shrine of the 117 is at So Kien in Ha Nam, where the memorial of November 24 draws the archdiocese and the Archbishop of Hanoi presides. At Hanoi the memorial is kept with particular solemnity at St. Joseph's Cathedral and at Cua Bac Church, in the city where Andrew Dung-Lac was beheaded. At Nam Dinh the lakeside shrine of the Queen of Martyrs stands on ground where Vietnamese Catholics were put to death under the Nguyen edicts, and keeps the feast on the day. At La Vang, the national Marian shrine, Our Lady appeared to Catholics hiding from the same persecution.