Today is the Feast of Saint Paul Miki and Companions. Happy feast day! Saint Paul Miki was a Jesuit brother and native of Japan who was crucified in 1597, along with 25 other Catholics, for preaching Jesus Christ and His Holy Church to the people of Japan.
Father Kyle Shinseki, pictured, Pastor of Saint Mary Student Parish in Ann Arbor, is of Japanese descent as well as a Jesuit and a convert to Catholicism. Father Kyle believes that the example and intercession of Saint Paul Miki and Companions inspired his path to the priesthood. How? Here's what Father Kyle has to say:
After I became Catholic as a junior in college, I often felt a disconnect between my newfound Catholic faith and my Japanese heritage since none of my close family were Catholic. So, my decision to travel for the first time to Japan just prior to entering the Jesuits in 2009, was with the hope to discover a link between my cultural roots and Catholic faith. One of my first stops was in Nagasaki, not only the place where 80% of the local Catholic population was killed by the atomic bomb in 1945, but also where Saint Paul Miki and Companions were martyred in 1597.
Jesuit Saint Francis Xavier brought the Catholic faith to Japan in 1549, which was at first widely embraced. However, by the latter part of the 1500’s, the persecution of Christians had become widespread. Born in 1564, Paul Miki’s family converted to Catholicism and he entered the Jesuits to study for the priesthood in 1586. Just months before he was to be ordained a priest, he was arrested and imprisoned with 25 others, Jesuits and Franciscans, then taken on a month-long walk to Nagasaki where they would be killed.
On February 5, 1597, as Paul Miki faced his imminent death, he proclaimed, “I hope my blood will fall on my fellow men as a fruitful rain…Like my Master I shall die upon the cross. Like Him, a lance will pierce my heart so that my blood and my love can flow out upon the land and sanctify it to His name.” He then cried out, “Jesus, Mary” as they pierced his side. The courageous witness of Saint Paul and his companions helped to give me the confidence to accept God’s call to the priesthood and to enter the Jesuit novitiate a few months after my trip.
