Saint Vincent Phạm Hiếu Liêm
Feast day: November 7
Saint Vincent Phạm Hiếu Liêm, Dominican priest, martyred at Đồng Mơ in 1773 (07/11)
Who is he?
Saint Vincent Phạm Hiếu Liêm was a Vietnamese Dominican priest who lived in the 18th century. He is one of the 117 Vietnamese Martyrs declared saints by Pope John Paul II on 19 June 1988. Among them, he is the earliest Vietnamese priest to die for the faith.
Life story
He was born in 1732 in the village of Trà Lũ, Nam Định, into a devout family. At 12, he entered the seminary. Because he was a good student and well behaved, the Dominican fathers sent him to Manila, in the Philippines, to study. There he asked to join the Dominican Order, taking the religious name Vincent. In 1758, he was ordained a priest, and then returned to his homeland.
Back home, he taught at the seminary, then cared for many parishes in the Nam Định area. He also went to villages that did not yet know God to preach the faith. At that time the Trịnh lords had banned the faith, and priests had to live in hiding.
On 2 October 1773, while he was helping the faithful prepare to celebrate the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, soldiers burst in and arrested him. He was tied up and taken away together with Father Hyacinth Castañeda (called Father Gia in Vietnam), a Spanish Dominican priest who had also just been arrested. In the capital, Thăng Long, according to tradition, the two priests calmly bore witness before the mandarins to God, the Creator of heaven and earth.
In the end, the two priests were sentenced to be beheaded. According to the account, Father Liêm said: “If you pardon, pardon us both; if you kill, kill us both. That alone is a just sentence.” He did not want to leave his fellow priest alone. On 7 November 1773, on the way to the execution ground at Đồng Mơ, the two priests prayed the Creed and sang the Hail, Holy Queen. He gave his life to God at the age of 41. His body was brought back and buried at Trung Linh.
Why is he a saint?
Saint Vincent Phạm Hiếu Liêm gave his whole life to proclaiming the Gospel in his homeland. He stayed faithful to God to the end and did not abandon his fellow priest in the hour of trial. In 1906, Pope Pius X beatified him.
A lesson for you
- Pray the Rosary faithfully, like Saint Vincent Liêm.
- Pray for priests and for seminarians preparing to serve God.
Identifying marks
- A palm branch: the branch held by martyrs in Vietnamese pictures and statues, a sign that he won the victory by daring to die for the Lord.
- A Rosary: the Dominicans have a special love for the Rosary; he was arrested while preparing the faithful to celebrate the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary.
- A white habit, a white scapular and a black cloak: the clothing of the Dominican friars (the Order of Preachers).
- A young Vietnamese man with short black hair and a gentle face: he was martyred at 41.
- Bamboo hedges, rice fields and thatched roofs behind him: the countryside of northern Vietnam, where he was born and where he preached.
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