Sunday 4 October27th Sunday in Ordinary TimeLiturgical colour: green
Stone & Incense
JourneysCurious, or no faithEvangelical, Pentecostal or ProtestantOrthodox, or other apostolic ChristianFallen-away CatholicBecoming CatholicGrowing CatholicAnother faith LibraryThe CaseVoices of the revivalFind a parishAboutSources & methodSupport the site
The saints

Sts Paul Miki and Companions

Twenty-six Christians on a hill above Nagasaki, and the joy that astonished the crowd.

Feast: 6 February · died 5 February 1597 · Nagasaki, Japan

Read the story 1 min read
The Twenty-Six Martyrs Monument on Nishizaka Hill in Nagasaki: a stone stairway and garden beneath the memorial.

Nesnad, 2022. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.

Home / The saints / Sts Paul Miki and Companions

Nagasaki, 5 February 1597

The first bloody persecution of Christians in Japan begins in 1597.1

On 5 February, twenty-six Christians, six of them Franciscan missionaries, are crucified at Nagasaki.1

The people who came to watch did not see what they expected.

01Sts Paul Miki and Companions

Joy on the hill

The pagans who watched the martyrdom were struck by the joy of the martyrs and the courage with which they met death.1

Persecution went on for decades, and a missionary wrote that fifty crosses multiplied a hundredfold would not have been enough for all who longed for martyrdom.1

The Twenty-Six Martyrs Monument on Nishizaka Hill in Nagasaki: a stone stairway and garden beneath the memorial.
The Twenty-Six Martyrs Monument and Museum on Nishizaka Hill, Nagasaki. Nesnad, 2022. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.

Notes

  1. Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), “Japanese Martyrs”. New Advent edition. newadvent.org

The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) is in the public domain; we quote the New Advent edition. Texts of the Holy See are quoted briefly from vatican.va. Scripture: Douay-Rheims, Challoner revision (public domain). Photographs: Wikimedia Commons, credited under each image; full list on the photo credits page.

Lines in the narrator’s voice, without a note, are our reflection, not a historical claim. Stone & Incense restates Church teaching in plain words; our wording is not an official Church text. Report an error.