【今日圣人】圣金大建司铎及同伴殉道

        十七世纪开始，由于一些教友的努力，基督信仰首先进入了高丽，建立了坚强而虔诚的团体；这团体没有牧者，几乎只是由教友领导与扶持的，直到1836年时，才有首批法国传教士秘密进入。

圣金大建及同伴殉道
(St. Andrew Kim Taegon & Companions)

韩国神职人员的主保 

       在1839、1846及1866年的各次教难中，从这团体中产生了103位殉道圣者，其中最著名的是该国第一位司铎及热诚的灵牧金安德（大建）及一位杰出的教友使徒丁保禄（圣夏）；其他殉道者多为教友，有男有女，有已婚与未婚者，有老年、少年及儿童，他们因接受罕见的刑罚，倾流了热血而殉道成仁，如此祝圣了高丽教会的开始。

金大建神父讲道 

       在1821年8月21日，金大建生于一个位于忠清南道的天主教家庭。当时为李氏朝鲜末年，金大建的高曾祖父本身是两班(即贵族)后人，曾因为邪狱而被害。

       1836年，15岁的金大建领洗，圣名安德肋(Andrew)。金大建与崔良业等一行人前往澳门修读神学。之后，他在上海金家巷堂区获祝圣为神父，并返回朝鲜传教。1846年9月16日被斩首殉道，当时年仅25岁。

       金大建是朝鲜半岛首位天主教神父，亦是第一位殉道的神父。

       1857年9月23日，他被教廷列为可敬者，1925年7月5日，被教廷列为真福品，1949年11月，在韩国被宣布为“韩国圣职者大主保。1984年5月6日，韩国立教200周年纪念，教宗若望·保禄二世访问韩国之际，封金大建为圣人品”。

圣金大建坟墓

Saints Andrew Kim Taegon, Paul Chong Hasang, and Companions

Saint of the Day for September 20

(August 21, 1821 – September 16, 1846; Companions d. between 1839 – 1867)

Saints Andrew Kim Taegon, Paul Chong Hasang, and Companions’ Story

The first native Korean priest, Andrew Kim Taegon was the son of Christian converts. Following his baptism at the age of 15, Andrew traveled 1,300 miles to the seminary in Macao, China. After six years, he managed to return to his country through Manchuria. That same year he crossed the Yellow Sea to Shanghai and was ordained a priest. Back home again, he was assigned to arrange for more missionaries to enter by a water route that would elude the border patrol. He was arrested, tortured, and finally beheaded at the Han River near Seoul, the capital.

Andrew’s father Ignatius Kim, was martyred during the persecution of 1839, and was beatified in 1925. Paul Chong Hasang, a lay apostle and married man, also died in 1839 at age 45.

上海浦东金家巷堂区后院的圣金大建神父塑像。（照片提供：陈增奇神父）

Among the other martyrs in 1839 was Columba Kim, an unmarried woman of 26. She was put in prison, pierced with hot tools and seared with burning coals. She and her sister Agnes were disrobed and kept for two days in a cell with condemned criminals, but were not molested. After Columba complained about the indignity, no more women were subjected to it. The two were beheaded. Peter Ryou, a boy of 13, had his flesh so badly torn that he could pull off pieces and throw them at the judges. He was killed by strangulation. Protase Chong, a 41-year-old nobleman, apostatized under torture and was freed. Later he came back, confessed his faith and was tortured to death.

Christianity came to Korea during the Japanese invasion in 1592 when some Koreans were baptized, probably by Christian Japanese soldiers. Evangelization was difficult because Korea refused all contact with the outside world except for taking taxes to Beijing annually. On one of these occasions, around 1777, Christian literature obtained from Jesuits in China led educated Korean Christians to study. A home Church began. When a Chinese priest managed to enter secretly a dozen years later, he found 4,000 Catholics, none of whom had ever seen a priest. Seven years later there were 10,000 Catholics. Religious freedom came to Korea in 1883.

Besides Andrew and Paul, Pope John Paul II canonized 98 Koreans and three French missionaries who had been martyred between 1839 and 1867, when he visited Korea in 1984. Among them were bishops and priests, but for the most part they were lay persons: 47 women and 45 men.

Reflection

We marvel at the fact that the Korean Church was strictly a lay Church for a dozen years after its birth. How did the people survive without the Eucharist? It is no belittling of this and other sacraments to realize that there must be a living faith before there can be a truly beneficial celebration of the Eucharist. The sacraments are signs of God’s initiative and response to faith already present. The sacraments increase grace and faith, but only if there is something ready to be increased.
（The English text is provided by Mr. Theodore Kim.)