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28th, 2001, marked the 100th Anniversary of the death of
Fr. Caio Rastelli, first Xaverian Missionary in China.
Monsignor Guido Conforti founded the Xaverian Missionary Congregation on Dec. 3, 1895. A little over three years later, Fr. Caio Rastelli and Deacon Edoardo Manini, the very first two members of the just sprouting foundation, sailed for China, the land of St. Francis Xavier’s dreams, and after two months, reached Sanyuan, capital of the Shaanxi province. They had been entrusted to the Franciscan Friars of that province, under the fatherly care of Fr. Francis Fogolla. In those days missionaries would leave to never return home, and China was then in the first throes of the Boxer rebellion, an anti-Christian movement, phobic and anything foreign. Some 40 thousand Christians were killed, among them 180 missionaries.
Deacon Manini, who had studied medicine, began work immediately at the hospital of Fong-el-Kuo. Instead, Fr. Rastelli, was sent to the remote western region of Shaanxi, some 200 miles away up in the Lulian Mountains in November of the same year. He went full of enthusiasm, aware that he may suffer much because of the climate, the food, and above all, of the isolation, worries and spiritual trials. “Too much joy fills my spirit – he wrote – how good it is to serve the Lord!”
Famine was a torment for the people and for himself who shared their lot. Worse still the rebellion was spreading like wildfire throughout the countryside, and the Boxers threw themselves ferociously against the white foreigners, any white, whom they considered invaders.
On July 9, 1900, at
Sanyuan, they killed Bishops Grassi and Fogolla, two priests, one brother, seven
sisters, five seminarians and nine helpers of the mission: 26 martyrs!
On October 1 2000, Pope John Paul II canonized 123 saints, 120 of which
were Chinese martyrs, including our 26. Also
killed on the same day and in the same place were the protestant ministers and
their families: 32 more martyrs for the Kingdom of God.
The fierceness of the Boxer persecution brings to mind the persecution of religion of other times, as that of Spain and Mexico in the late 1920’s and early 30’s, “the fiercest persecution of religion anywhere since the reign of Elizabeth” of England.
Deacon Manini and others escaped west and reached Fr. Rastelli. Together for months on end they kept on eluding the soldiers, who felled many a Christian in their pursuit. The track to reach safety continued through mountains and valleys, until wandering into Mongolia and rounding south into Shaanxi again, on Christmas eve of 1900, they returned to Tong-el-Kuo which was experiencing a temporary and relative calm. Fr. Caio, though greatly weakened by the constant pursuit suffered for months, resumed his pastoral and charitable activities now multiplied because of the many deaths among “the valiant workers of the Gospel,” as he himself wrote.
But the many wanderings among the miseries of his people and the burden of their demands overcame his physical resistance, and typhus drew the last sap out of his life.
At the dawn of Feb. 28, 1901, assisted by his confrere, deacon Manini, Fr. Caio Rastelli rendered his soul to the Lord. He was only 29 years old less a month. To neither of the two young missionaries was granted the “beautiful sort” of martyrdom!
One does not seek out martyrdom. One has to learn that holiness and communion are attained in the daily practice of charity and love for God and neighbor which takes flesh and visibility in the simple gestures of self-forgetfulness and of attention to the other, of service and solidarity, of unity with those who suffer and of fidelity to the missionary mandate. Blessed Guido Conforti will remind often his missionaries: “The Crucifix must be your joy, your all, and from him, who has shed up to the last drop of his blood for human redemption, learn to sacrifice yourselves for your brothers and sisters… If you will not experience the martyrdom of blood, there won’t be lacking that of self-sacrifice and suffering, a martyrdom continued and more demanding than the real one.” (1904)
Sure paths to the coming of the Kingdom are the simple and bright words of the Gospel, the example of a saintly life, the practice of charity, sacrifice… that’s true martyrdom, also!
(From Xaverian Mission Newsletter)