From the Martyrologium Romanum
7. Olomucii in Moravia, sancti Ioannis Sarkander, presbyteri et martyris, qui parochus Holesovienses, cum arcana confessionum tradere renuisset, rotae supplicio datus est et adhus spirans in carcerem deictus post mensem obiit.
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since Sat., 25 Nov. 2006:
Happy Feast of St. Patrick!
Holy Bishop Patrick,
Faithful shepherd of Christ’s royal flock,
You filled Ireland with the radiance of the Gospel:
The mighty strength of the Trinity!
Now that you stand before the Savior,
Pray that He may preserve us in faith and love!
From slavery you escaped to freedom in Christ’s service:
He sent you to deliver Ireland from the devil’s bondage.
You planted the Word of the Gospel in pagan hearts.
In your journeys and hardships you rivaled the Apostle Paul!
Having received the reward for your labors in heaven,
Never cease to pray for the flock you have gathered on earth,
Holy bishop Patrick! +
Deus, qui ad praedicandam gentibus gloriam tuam beatum Patricium, Confessorem atque Pontificem, mittere dignatus es: ejus meritis, et intercessione concede; ut quae nobis agenda praecipis, te miserante, adimplere possimus.
I’m just wondering, how did this day turn into an Irish drunk fest?
APX, that’s easy. The same way Mardi Gras turned into a drunken orgy: the paganization of Christian days.
While Celtic Druids get sauced, my crowd has 2 days to make the sauce and get ready for a REAL Saint’s Day, March 19th. And two days to hose away the green beer vomited on our sidewalks.
Thanks for living down to my low opinion of you Celtic Chicagoans.
Wake up chaps. Not St. Patrick, St John Sarkander.
Did anyone happen to notice that Fr. Z’s text from the Martyrologium Romanum was about Saint Jan Sarkander and not Saint Patrick? I’m just asking.
Other than Muv and me, I mean…
He seems more interesting than Patrick, just sayin’
St. Jan Sarkander was married at a young age, became a widower not long after, and then got further educated and became a priest. There’s not many shoutouts for widowers, so I thought I’d mention that.
It seems that he was in a very nasty situation, as one of the local landowner barons was Catholic and the other was anti-Catholic, and it was also the middle of the Thirty Years War, and there was also all the Hussite trouble going on (he was a notable apologist/re-evangelist against the Hussites). He was eventually arrested for just going to the local invading Polish commander with a Eucharistic procession and begging him not to invade the parish. This was taken by his enemies as evidence that he was a traitor and spy (I guess because the Poles didn’t go through the parish after all), and then it got worse because the Hussites got into the act.
Anyway, anti-Catholic landowner was hoping to get the priest tortured into saying that Catholic landowner was a traitor, presumably so that Catholic landowner’s lands would be forfeit and go to him. Sarkander held out against torture and foiled that part of the plan. Presumably the Hussites were okay with just getting rid of a troublesome apologist, though.
“In Olomuk, Moravia, St. Jan Sarkander, priest and martyr who was parish priest of Hollenschau
when he refused to give up the secrets of confession, was tortured on the wheel, and
still breathing in prison, died of his wounds after a month.”
dinsdale, yes.
The Feast of various wonderful homines, I find, consulting Saints.SQPN.com! St. Gertrude, daughter of King St. Pepin and Queen St. Ida and sister of St. Begga, for example, and St. Paul of Cyprus, tortured to death by that sort of small-c catholics known as Iconoclasts, and also St. Joseph of Arimathea!
St. Jan’s terrible, ultimately deadly experiences (which Francis Mershman in his article in the old Catholic Encyclopedia describes as including a lot more than the ‘rota’!) reminded me of Henk van Nierop’s study, Treason in the Northern Quarter: War, Terror, and the Rule of Law in the Dutch Revolt (Princeton UP, 2009) which documents how the particular Reformed inquisitors involved went beyond generally permitted degrees and methods of torture (including not only uses of fire analogous to those which lead to the death of St. Jan, but a use of starving rodents which Orwell may have borrowed for 1984, and forcing someone to submit to sexual relations with an animal!). The intriguing last part of Van Nierop’s title is explained in the book description (e.g., at Amazon): the book tells “how Jan Jeroenszoon [a young Catholic lawyer], through great personal courage and faith in the rule of law, managed to survive gruesome torture and vindicate himself by successfully arguing at trial that the authorities remained subject to the law even in times of war.”
Listening to a recording of “Hail, Glorious St. Patrick” today, I was particularly struck by the lines, “our hearts shall yet burn […] For God, and St. Patrick, and our native home” – the distinct and proper loves of land and culture and beyond those of grateful love of the apostle and living patron of that land ordered with respect to the love of God.
@dinsdale, yes, I did see that the original post wasn’t about St Patrick, but on March 17 there is only one “wonderful saint” for me. Still, I should probably be disciplined for off-topic posting.
@APX, here is one view of how the Irishdrinkfest thing began – blame the Guinness ads. http://life.nationalpost.com/2014/03/15/an-irishman-explains-how-his-country-became-a-beer-ad/
My attempt at a translation:
(On March 17th the feast of) Saint John Sarkander a priest and martry, who was a parish priest in Holleschau, died in Olmütz a month after being tortured on the wheel, for refusing to betray the secrecy of confession.
Ooops, I forgot the “in prison” part.