Für Afrika geboren – Msgr. Léon Livinhac M.Afr., Apostolischer Vikar von Victoria-Nyanza

 

Neben dem Gründer Kardinal Lavigerie ist kein Name so eng mit der frühen Entwicklung der Missionare von Afrika („Weiße Väter“) verbunden wie der von Léon Livinhac. Der Gründer der Kirche Ugandas und direkte Nachfolger des imposanten Erzbischofs von Algier führte die Weißen Väter durch turbulente Zeiten und förderte gleichzeitig die afrikanischen Missionen als Ganzes, besonders auch die Ausbildung eines einheimischen Klerus, die Lavigerie so am Herzen gelegen hatte.

Der kränkliche Waisenjunge

Léon Livinhac wurde am 13. Juli 1846 als Sohn frommer Bauersleute in der kleinen Gemeinde Buzeins in Okzitanien geboren. Wegen des frühen Todes der Eltern wurde der Junge von seiner Großmutter und seinen Tanten sowie von seinem Großonkel, dem Pfarrer von Bonneterre, aufgezogen. Er war ein frommes und fleißiges Kind, jedoch schüchtern und kränklich. Seine Schulzeit am Diözesankolleg von Saint Geniez wurde sogar durch eine Beinlähmung unterbrochen. Es gab zunächst kaum Anzeichen, dass dieser Waisenjunge eines Tages einer der bedeutendsten Afrikamissionare des 19. Jahrhunderts werden sollte. Als seine Gesundheit schließlich genug gekräftigt war, konnte er 1867 ins Seminar von Rodez aufgenommen werden, das damals von den Sulpizianern geleitet wurde. Im selben Jahr trat Félix Charmetant in Algier ins Diözesanseminar ein und stellte sich wenig später zusammen mit Francisque Deguerry bei Erzbischof Charles Lavigerie vor, angetrieben von dem Wunsch, sich ganz der Mission unter den Moslems und Heiden Afrikas zu widmen. Es war die Geburtsstunde der Weißen Väter.

Der liebenswürdige Pater Charmetant wurde in den folgenden Jahren von Lavigerie nach Europa geschickt, um dort um Missionspersonal zu werben. So traf er im Seminar von Rodez auf den Seminaristen Livinhac, der sich interessiert zeigte. Allerdings dauerte es bis zu seiner Diakonatsweihe im Jahr 1872, als Léon Livinhac auf die Ermutigung seines Freundes P. Charbonnier ebenfalls zu den Missionaren von Afrika stieß.

Für Afrika geboren

Nur ein Jahr nach seinem Noviziatsbeginn und der Priesterweihe durch Erzbischof Lavigerie wurde Livinhac zum Professor der Dogmatik und zum Mitglied des Generalrats seiner Gemeinschaft ernannt. Zwischenzeitlich leitete er auch die Prokur in Paris. Die Arbeit sagte ihm nicht zu. Kurze Zeit später nach Algerien zurückgekehrt, sagte er: „Ich bin für Afrika geboren und nur für Afrika“. Seine ersten missionarischen Erfahrungen sammelte er in Ouadhias in Kabylien, wo er Seelsorgsarbeit unter der Berberbevölkerung betrieb. Weitere wichtige Posten in der Ausbildung von Ordensmitgliedern folgten, bis P. Livinhac 1878 von Lavigerie an die Spitze der ersten Missionskarawane zu den Afrikanischen Großen Seen gesetzt wurde.

Die Mission in Uganda entwickelte sich rasch äußerst günstig, wenngleich sie durch das komplexe Gefüge aus der Feindseligkeit des Herrschers Mutesa – der die Missionare ins Land geholt hatte – und der Einflussnahme arabischer Händler und europäischer Kolonialmächte am Hof stets in ihrem Bestehen bedroht war. Zugleich mit seiner angestrengten missionarischen Arbeit betätigte sich P. Livinhac als Linguist und schrieb die erste Grammatik der Luganda-Sprache, die 1885 erschien. Im Jahr 1883 erfolgte die Ernennung Livinhacs zum Apostolischen Vikar von Victoria-Nyanza. Zum bischöflichen Motto hatte er sich den Spruch Totus tuus ego sum („Ich bin ganz dein“) erwählt, ein Ausdruck seiner tiefen Marienverehrung. Da die Bischofsweihe im Maison Carrée in Algier durch Kardinal Lavigerie gespendet wurde, dauerte es bis Juni 1886, als Msgr. Livinhac in seine Mission zurückkehren konnte.

Bischof der Märtyrerkirche

Die Lage in Uganda hatte sich weiter zugespitzt. Als König Mwanga, Mutesas Sohn und Nachfolger, seine katholischen Diener und Beamten verfolgte, stärkte sie Msgr. Livinhac mit dem Sakrament der Firmung. Bis zu fünfmal pro Nacht suchten die Christen ihren Bischof im Schutz der Dunkelheit auf, um sich auf den grausamen Martertod vorzubereiten. Wiederholte Versuche von Seiten der Mission, den König von seinem Tun abzubringen, waren gescheitert. Aufgrund der gespannten Lage, die auch nach dem Ende der Verfolgung durch Mwanga eine Gefahr für die Missionare darstellte, verbrachte Msgr. Livinhac die meiste Zeit seit seiner Ernennung in Bukumbi in Tansania. Kardinal Lavigerie hatte seinen Missionaren streng befohlen, ihr Leben zu schonen, und Livinhac war immer bestrebt, die Weisungen seines geistlichen Vaters aufs Genaueste zu befolgen. Ein geschichtsträchtiges Ereignis brachte das Jahr 1887, als Livinhac Pater Jean-Baptiste Charbonnier in Kipalapala zum Bischof weihte. Dieser war zum Apostolischen Vikar von Tanganyika ernannt worden. Es war die erste Bischofsweihe in Äquatorialafrika.

Als Nachfolger Lavigeries

Bald kam die direkte Missionstätigkeit Msgr. Livinhacs zu einem jähen Ende: Das Generalkapitel in Karthago wählte ihn im September 1889 in seiner Abwesenheit zum Generaloberer der Weißen Väter. Am darauffolgenden Pfingstfest weihte er seinen Nachfolger Jean-Joseph Hirth zum Bischof, bevor er das Land der Großen Seen für immer verließ.

Noch bis zu seinem Tod im Jahr 1892 blieb Kardinal Lavigerie das alleinige Haupt seiner Missionsgesellschaft. Alle Werke waren engstens mit seiner imposanten Person verbunden. Kritiker bescheinigten den Weißen Vätern eine kurze Lebensdauer nach dem Tod ihres Gründers. Doch durch Msgr. Livinhac, den der Kardinal sich wegen seiner Frömmigkeit und Gelehrtheit als Nachfolger wünschte, nahm die Gemeinschaft in den nächsten 30 Jahren eine noch klarere Form an.

Die Aufgaben und Schwierigkeiten für den neuen Oberen entsprachen in ihrer Zahl und Komplexität den bewegten Zeiten. Gerade in den 1890er Jahren galt es, die Mission gegenüber den verschiedenen Kolonialmächten Innerafrikas zu vertreten. Zu den interkonfessionellen Konflikten zwischen Protestanten und Katholiken in Uganda kam hinzu, dass die Briten die französische Missionsgesellschaft als verlängerten Arm der französischen Regierung wahrnahmen. Msgr. Livinhac musste diesen Irrtum klarstellen. Er ging im Jahr 1895 sogar so weit, dass er das Apostolische Vikariat des Obernils der britischen Missionsgesellschaft von Mill Hill übergab, um die Wogen zu glätten. Es ging ihm nicht um die Erhaltung des Apostolats der Weißen Väter, er wollte vielmehr das Bestehen der katholischen Missionen gegenüber der weltlichen Macht und der starken protestantischen Präsenz sichern.
In Frankreich bedrohten die antiklerikalen Gesetze der 1900er Jahre das Wirken der Weißen Väter. Besonders in Algerien, wo den Missionaren bereits die direkte Missionsarbeit unter der muslimischen Bevölkerung verboten war, wurde die Gesellschaft bis 1914 fast vollständig aus dem Unterricht verdrängt.
Großes Leid brachte der Erste Weltkrieg. Sechzig Mitglieder der Missionsgesellschaft starben im Krieg, eine ähnlich hohe Zahl an Berufungen ging verloren. Msgr. Livinhac unterließ es nicht, seine geistlichen Söhne auf den Schlachtfeldern mit seinen Rundschreiben zu stärken und sie zu einem musterhaften sittlichen Betragen und zur Selbstheiligung zu ermahnen.

Wirken für die Gesellschaft und die afrikanischen Missionen

Die Rundschreiben waren sein Hauptmittel, den guten Geist und die Treue zur Missionsgesellschaft unter seinen weitverstreuten Missionaren zu fördern und wichtige missionarische Anweisungen zu geben. So warnte er im Rundschreiben von Lichtmess 1918 davor, auf möglichst schnelle Taufen abzuzielen. Es sei besser, eine geringere Zahl von vorbildlichen Christen zu haben, als mittelmäßige und schlechte, die andere Leute abstoßen würden. Speziell lag ihm auch die Bildung eines einheimischen Klerus am Herzen. Er folgte der Ansicht Kardinal Lavigeries, dass Afrika durch Afrikaner bekehrt werden würde. Die afrikanischen Seminaristen sollten gründlich ausgebildet und geprüft werden und nur bei zweifelloser Bewährtheit zur Weihe zugelassen werden. Als kluger Kenner innerafrikanischer Verhältnisse zeigte sich Msgr. Livinhac unter anderem, als er auf dem Generalkapitel 1906 davor warnte, in Gegenden, wo der Fetischglaube noch stark war, viele Andachten einzuführen und viele verschiedene Medaillen zu verteilen. Es könne sonst bei den Neuchristen der Eindruck entstehen, dass es sich hier um Talismane im heidnischen Sinne handelte.

Der Generalobere stand in hohem Ansehen bei seinen Missionaren, ja im Ruf der Heiligkeit. Das erklärt seine dreimalige Wiederwahl, die 1906 zur Ernennung als Generaloberer auf Lebenszeit führte. Pius X. bestätigte die Ordenskonstitutionen im Jahr 1908 endgültig. Während der 30-jährigen Amtszeit Livinhacs wuchsen die Weißen Väter nicht nur in den Missionen, sondern auch in Europa und Kanada beträchtlich. Verschiedene Provinzen, darunter auch in Deutschland, wurden errichtet. Eine große Freude brachte das Jahr 1920, als Ugandas Märtyrer von Papst Benedikt XV. seliggesprochen wurden.

Am 11. November 1922 starb Msgr. Léon Livinhac im Maison Carrée in Algerien nach fast 50 Jahren im Dienst der afrikanischen Missionen. Seit 1975 ruhen seine Gebeine in Uganda in der Memorial Chapel von Nabulagala, von wo aus er mit seinen Gefährten 1879 begann, das Land zu missionieren. An diesem Ort hatte der junge Pater Léon Livinhac das erste heilige Messopfer auf dem Boden Ugandas gefeiert.

100 years of Rerum Ecclesiae: China's own bishops

Cardinal Thomas Tien, SVD, Archbishop of Peking, consecrating Bishop Peter Wang Muduo of Xuanhua in 1948 (source: Whitworth University)

On this day 100 years ago, Pope Pius XI published an encyclical on the missions that in many respects would usher in a new missionary era for the Church. Throughout this anniversary, I plan to post a number of articles shedding light on different aspects of this significant papal document. One of the chief purposes of the encyclical Rerum ecclesiæ gestarum was to further the formation of a hierarchy of native Catholic bishops in mission territories. The lack of such bishops had already been lamented by Pope Benedict the XV in the apostolic letter Maximum Illud, published in 1919. After recalling the sorrow of his immediate predecessor in Rerum ecclesiæ, Pius XI points out how in the earliest days of the Church, “the clergy placed in charge of the faithful in each new community by the Apostles were not men brought in from the outside but were chosen from the natives of that locality”. He goes on to address the European missionary bishops: “From the fact that the Roman Pontiff has entrusted to you and to your assistants the task of preaching the Christian religion to pagan nations, you ought not to conclude that the role of the native clergy is merely one of assisting the missionaries in minor matters, of merely following up and completing their work. What, We ask, is the true object of these holy missions if it be not this, that the Church of Christ be founded and established in these boundless regions?“ This last observation is noteworthy since it constitutes  a genuine doctrinal development of missionary ecclesiology and would be reflected by Pius’ XI actions throughout his pontificate. It points to the plantatio ecclesiæ as the final goal of missionary work.

That the native clergy had not produced any bishops–at least not in recent centuries–was especially conspicuous in the Church’s largest mission territory, China. The only Chinese bishop in history had been Luo Wenzao, who served as the Vicar Apostolic of Nanjing from 1685 until his death in 1691. The Celestial Empire had experienced a growth of nationalism following the country’s forced opening towards Western powers in the middle of the 19^th century, a trend that continued well into the Republican era starting in 1912. Nationalist propaganda often depicted the Church as something foreign; Chinese Catholics did not remain immune to these claims.

Pius XI consecrating six Chinese bishops in St. Peter in 1926 (colorization courtesy of Michael Baker)

The consecration of six Chinese bishops at the hands of the Pope in St. Peter’s on 28 October 1926 was a clear signal that Pius XI paid attention to increased nationalist sentiment and to the justified desire for a Chinese church led by a Chinese clergy.[1] In the wake of these consecrations, ecclesiastical territories were created in China to be administered by Chinese prelates, as was the case of the Apostolic Vicariate of Jining, created in 1929 with Msgr. Evariste Chang as its head. Msgr. Chang was consecrated in Rome by the Prefect of the Congregation de Propaganda Fide, Cardinal van Rossum, while others received the plenitude of the priesthood from European bishops in their native China. History was written once again in 1931 when Simon Zhu Kaimin became the first Chinese bishop to consecrate[2] another Chinese bishop in Boniface Yang Fujie, auxiliary of Canton.

Bishop Melchior Su Dezhen of Anguo (seated, not visible) consecrating his successor Jean-Baptiste Wang

Especially noteworthy among the prelates appointed by Pius XI are the future cardinals Thomas Tien and Paul Yu Pin, created by Pius XII and Paul VI, respectively. Thomas Tien was the first Chinese cardinal and the first cardinal of the Society of the Divine Word, which he joined after having begun his ministry as a diocesan priest. Pius XI appointed him Apostolic Prefect of Yangku, while Pius XII made him Vicar Apostolic, then Bishop of Tsingtao, and finally Archbishop of Peking and Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church. Invested with the highest honors, he remained a pious and simple missionary with great fervor. After he was driven from mainland China in 1951, Cardinal Tien played a pivotal role in the considerable growth of the Church in Taiwan during the 1950s and 1960s. Like Tien, Paul Yu Pin hailed from northern China and would go on to become the archbishop of one of China’s historical capitals in Nanjing. He was both ordained a priest and consecrated a bishop during the reign of Pius XI. Yu Pin also had to flee mainland China for Taiwan, where he consecrated the future Archbishop of Taipei Matthew Kia Yen-Wen, who in turn consecrated Paul Shan Kuo-Hsi, S.J., later Bishop of Kaohsiung in Taiwan and cardinal. Both Tien and Yu Pin left a deep pastoral and educational imprint on Taiwan’s church.

It was largely thanks to the groundwork laid by Pius XI that Pius XII could officially establish the Chinese Catholic hierarchy in April of 1946 with the Bull Quotidie Nos, which formed 20 ecclesiastical provinces attached to the same number of archdioceses, three of which were headed by Chinese bishops. Most of the 79 dioceses that had formerly been Apostolic Vicariates were led by Chinese prelates.

The overwhelming majority of the bishops and prelates named by Pius XI who lived to suffer persecution under the new Communist rulers in the 1950s stood firmly with the Holy See, judging from what research into this turbulent era of Chinese history permits. Many were forced into exile in Taiwan, the United States, and Europe. The two last surviving bishops out of the six consecrated by Pius XI in 1926, Simon Zhu Kaimin and Joseph Hu Ruoshan, died in China in the early 1960s. Both had been persecuted by the government, the latter dying while imprisoned. A notable exception to this general loyalty among the Pian Chinese bishops was Francis Xavier Zhao Zhensheng, Bishop of Xianxian. Initially persecuted by the Communists, Zhao Zhensheng later gave in to the Communist push for an “independent” church, participating in the founding conference of the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association in 1957. In 1958 he illicitly consecrated a total of seven Chinese bishops, all of whom would exercise their ministry independently of the Holy See and therefore illegitimately. Tragic irony marked his last years, as he was persecuted during the Cultural Revolution’s purges aiming to abolish all religions. Bishop Zhao Zhensheng died between 1968 and 1970 in Communist internment. The Chinese government publicly rehabilitated him in 1981. Through his episcopal lineage, the state-controlled church in China remains connected to Pius XI and his genuine concern that the Universal Church in China be governed by Chinese bishops in full communion with the Holy See.

The establishment of a native episcopate in China by Pius XI was both symbolic and impactful. It showed that Rome did not regard non-European Catholics as second-class citizens, good enough to be baptized, but never equipped to lead their local churches. The Chinese episcopate proved its worth during the turmoil of wars and persecution. The farsighted policy of Pius XI prepared China’s Church to be governed throughout decades without the help of foreign missionaries. Let us hope and pray that one day, China’s Church may proclaim the Gospel freely under the leadership of Chinese bishops in union with Rome, showing that Catholicism in China can be both genuinely Chinese and Roman at the same time.

---

[1] Out of the 19 bishops Pius XI consecrated during his pontificate, twelve were Asian, of which in turn nine were Chinese.

[2] As the principal consecrator

Zum Sonntag Quinquagesima: Licht den Blinden

 Die Blindheit der Heidenwelt soll gehoben werden durch das Licht des wahren Glaubens. Dieses Licht, andächtige Christen, muss ihnen gebracht, und zwar durch uns gebracht werden. Unser Glaube muss seinen hellen Schein in die Nacht der Heidenwelt tragen: „Ihr seid das Licht der Welt“ (Mt 5, 14). Wir alle sind nach den Worten des hl. Paulus Lichtkinder und Tagessöhne (1 Thess 5, 5), und Lichtträger sollen wir sein der Heidenwelt. „Gesetzt habe ich dich zum Lichte der Heiden, dass du seiest zum Heile bis an das Ende der Erde“ (Apg 13, 47). Diese Worte, die von den ersten Heidenmissionären, den hll. Paulus und Barnabas, geschrieben stehen, gelten auch von jedem Missionär, der mit der Leuchte des Evangelium zu den Heiden hinauszieht, gelten von jedem Christen, der in seiner Glaubensüberzeugung das heilige Missionswerk unterstützt. Nur auf diese Weise kann die Kirche ihre Missionspflicht erfüllen und im Namen ihres göttlichen Stifters auf die Bitte der Heidenwelt antworten.

(Aus: Robert Streit O.M.I.: Missionspredigten, Herder, 1913)

Video: Solemn Pontifical Mass of Cardinal Agagianian in Korea

 

Caeremoniale Romane recently uploaded this video of the Servant of God Cardinal Gregorio Pietro Agagianian celebrating a Pontifical Mass at the cathedral of Seoul during his visit to Korea in 1959. Cardinal Agagianian was not only the Armenian Catholic Patriarch of Cilicia, but also the Prefect of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith and as such inspected Korea's Catholic missions during this weeklong trip. Agagianian was bi-ritual, celebrating both his native Armenian rite and the Roman rite, using the latter during his visits to mission countries as Prefect.

Here is a contemporary news article on his visit:

HONOR GUARD, 19-GUN SALUTE 3ID 3/15/59 " FAREWELL TO CARDINAL AGAGIANIAN AT END OF 6-DAY VISIT TO KOREA SEOUL, Korea, March 13 (Radio, NC)— Korean Army and Air Force personnel stood rigidly at attention while a 19-gun salute boomed out in farewell to His Eminence Gregorio Pietro XV Cardinal Agagianian at the conclusion of his week-long visit to this country. Thousands of Catholics joined Korea's Vice President John M. Chang, Church dignitaries and government officials in a final tribute to the Pro-Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, who flew to Japan on the final leg of his extensive tour of the Far East. In a brief ceremony at Seoul's airport Bishop Harold Henry, S.S.C., Vicar Apostolic of Kwangju, gave the Cardinal a spiritual bouquet of Masses and Communions to be presented to His Holiness Pope John XXIII on behalf of Korean Catholics in answer to the Pontiff's request for prayers for the Church of Silence. Before boarding the plane to Japan Cardinal Agagianian thanked government authorities for the facilities placed at his disposal during his visits to various mission centers. He also thanked United Nations and U.S. military authorities for their cooperation in supplying him with a plane for his tour of Korea. Official receptions, religious ceremonies and public functions highlighted the Cardinal's eight-day visit. In Seoul the prelate offered a Pontifical Mass in the city's cathedral and dedicated the new Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Included In the Cardinal's itinerary vías a visit to Chinhae, on the southern coast of the country, for a meeting with President Syngman Rhee of Korea and Mrs. Rhee. The Cardinal presented the Korean chief of state with a gold medal commemorating the first year of Pope John's pontificate. Traveling by rail and road whenever weather conditions did not permit him to fly. Cardinal Agagianian stopped over at Chun Chon where he visited the graves of three Columban priests killed by North Korean Reds in 1950.

Kardinal Rauscher über das Steyler Missionswerk

 

Noch kurz vor seinem Tod im Jahr 1875 zeigte Kardinal Joseph Othmar von Rauscher, Fürsterzbischof von Wien, nach Arnold Janssens Besuch seine Unterstützung für das junge Steyler Missionswerk:

„Die Völker, denen das Licht des Christentums aufgegangen ist, erfüllen eine Pflicht der Dankbarkeit gegen den göttlichen Heiland, wenn sie sich ihm als Werkzeuge (der Heidenmission) leihen ... Herr A. Janßen unternimmt ein frommes, gottgefälliges Werk, dem der Herr Segen und Gedeihen verleihen möchte!“

Danken wir an diesem Fest des heiligen Arnold Janssen Gott dafür, dass dieser Wunsch des Kardinals so reich in Erfüllung gegangen ist.

America's missionary crusader

Frater Clifford King (standing on the right) with his confreres after having received his missionary cross for China. (Source: Chicago Province SVD)

Fr. Clifford King was born in Upstate New York in 1888 and entered the Society of the Divine Word in Techny, IL in 1909, fulfilling his childhood desire of becoming a missionary. As a seminarian, he founded the Catholic Student Mission Crusade, which soon had thousands of members and about a million in 1963.

He was sent to China in 1919, still a "frater", to replace the German SVD missionaries who had been expelled during WWI. In 1920, the young missionary was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Henninghaus, making him the first American priest of the Society of the Divine Word. Msgr. Froewis, who would become a mentor to Fr. King, preached the ordination retreat about holiness, zeal, and learning as characteristics of a missionary.

Fr. King served in many Chinese missions over the next 20 years, only fleeing from the Japanese in 1941 as they approached Beijing. Having arrived in the Philippines, Father soon was forced to escape the Emperor's troops again, this time on a submarine! After the war, he became the secretary of Cardinal Tien, SVD, a position he held until 1960, when at the age of 72, he volunteered for a leper hospital in Papua New Guinea. "I will certainly be happy in New Guinea; because I will work among the poorest of the poor, and God's mercy will be close to us", he said about his new work.

Six years later, King returned to the States, where he wrote his autobiography "I remember" while serving as a chaplain in an Iowa hospital. "America's missionary crusader" died in Techny in 1969.

China remained his great love. He would often start conversations with the words "When I was in China".

May he have joined China's martyrs and saints in Heaven!

“The violent take it by force”: The Little Brothers of St. John the Baptist

Fr. Vincent Lebbe (center) with the Little Brothers of St. John the Baptist

Father Vincent Lebbe

The cradle of one of the Catholic Church’s most austere religious communities stood in Northern China. Its founder Father Vincent Lebbe (1877–1940), a Vincentian missionary from Belgium with a deep love for China and the Chinese, envisioned a monastic foundation that was “truly Chinese”. This vision gave birth to the Little Brothers of St. John the Baptist, whose charism reflects both his ideal of a native Chinese Church and of a monastic order that followed the spirit of the Beatitudes.

As a great advocate of a native Chinese hierarchy at the beginning of the 20^th century, Fr. Lebbe championed the consecration of the first six Chinese bishops in almost 300 years. He also had a deep appreciation for Benedictine monasticism, which developed through visits and letters to the famous abbey of Maredsous, where his brother Adrien had entered religion as Dom Bède. In one of his letters from 1906, Fr. Vincent outlined that any Benedictines coming to China should be “monastic apostles” who worked above all in education and were at the same time deeply embedded in Chinese society. In the early 1920s, he encouraged Fr. Jehan Joliet, O.S.B. of St. Andrew’s Abbey in Bruges to found an inculturated Benedictine monastery dedicated to study in Xishan.

Fr. Lebbe with Bishops Melchior Sun Dezhen 孫德楨 and Zhao Huaiyi 趙懷義.

The final impetus for making a foundation of his own came when Fr. Lebbe visited the Apostolic Prefecture of Lixian in southeastern China along with Bishop Melchior Sun Dezhen, C.M. at the end of 1927. Local priests told him about the difficulties of finding “educated and virtuous” teachers while at the same time not overburdening the mission financially. Fr. Lebbe suggested the foundation of a religious community which would fulfill for free the services hitherto provided by salaried auxiliary personnel. Bishop Sun approved of this idea, and so the Monastery of the Beatitudes was born. Lebbe wrote: “The society to be founded by Bishop Sun would appeal to every adult celibate who desires to render service to the church under the protection of holy vows and community life. (…) Every skill can be used; everyone would be admitted. (…) One essential point: they would form a lay congregation, and all would be absolutely equal. They would have only one community house for the entire prefecture and would return to it whenever their work would not summon them outside”. The community did not remain a lay foundation for long as clerics asked to be admitted as well, but radical equality was maintained nonetheless. No priest was to be served by lay brothers and the hierarchy within the monastic family was based strictly on seniority, not on belonging to the clerical or lay state.

An austere foundation

Soon, six aspiring monks presented themselves to Fr. Lebbe, under the condition that their rule of life be austere. Most of them had desired to enter the Trappist Order at Our Lady of Consolation Abbey, so their idea of the religious life matched the new foundation well. On 16 December 1928 Bishop Sun blessed the Monastery of the Beatitudes in Anguo, situated in his Apostolic Vicariate in northern China. The habit worn by the novices consisted of a grey robe of coarse material, a leather belt and the traditional black Benedictine scapular on which a small cross was embroidered. The furnishing of the religious house breathed the spirit of evangelical poverty and matched the order’s later rule which stipulated that all superfluous adornments be avoided. The monastery buildings resembled “the houses of the farmers around them; the roofs are flat and the walls made of bricks (…) Even during the harshest winter cold there is no heating, for economy’s sake.” The monks’ diet consisted strictly of cereals, vegetables and fruits, excluding all animal products, and thus their table was arguably even more austere than that of the rural communities surrounding them, whose farmers rarely ever ate meat. This life of abnegation is reflected in the order’s motto “the violent take it by force”, referencing Christ’s words in the Gospel of Matthew regarding St. John the Baptist and all those who are striving for the kingdom of Heaven. The monks were to sustain themselves by agricultural work, crafts and lending a helping hand to their neighbors.

A Little Brother carrying vegetables

Just as they followed their patron saint in his mortifications, the Little Brothers of St. John the Baptist also imitated him by announcing Christ to the people through their catechetical work. The monks were to be “Carthusians in the house, apostles outside”, sanctifying themselves at their monastery so they could fruitfully announce the Gospel, as teachers in schools, as catechists, in the ministry among prisoners or in the services of Catholic Action.

Little Brothers pronouncing their vows

The Divine Office in Chinese

Following his Benedictine influence, Fr. Lebbe wanted the opus Dei to be “above all else”. To make the Liturgy of the Hours more accessible to his Chinese religious, he started by translating the little Office of Our Lady and the Office of the Dead into Chinese (recordings can be found here). Parts of the texts were taken from the Chinese Missal authorized by Paul V in the 17^th century, but which had never been used in practice. His death in 1940 prevented him from sinicizing the entire Divine Office, yet Lebbe had still put together a choir book of seven hundred pages containing the Offices for the principal feasts of the year. It was masterfully bound and decorated with Chinese-style miniatures, a product of the monastery’s print shop.

The Ave maris stella in Chinese written by Fr. Lebbe

The Little Brothers in the crucible of war and persecution

By 1933 the community numbered 110 members and the first daughter houses were founded in other vicariates. That same year Fr. Lebbe left the Vincentians with the approval of his superiors and officially became a professed member of the Little Brothers. Rome had been watching the developments in China and encouraged Fr. Lebbe and his disciples in their efforts.

When Japan invaded Northern China in 1937, Fr. Lebbe appealed to the patriotic spirit of his religious to help their people as medics at the front. The brothers soon became very popular with wounded soldiers and maintained their monastic life even in the turmoil of the battlefields, observing all rules, praying the Divine Office and keeping the silence as strictly as any Trappist would. Twelve little brothers were killed by Communists in early 1940, while another monk was beheaded by the Japanese at the monastery in Anguo. Fr. Vincent himself was captured by Communists in 1940 and subjected to weeks of torture. He was released on 13 April and died on 24 June of the same year, the Feast of St. John the Baptist.

Fr. Lebbe on his death bed with Bishop Paul Yu Bin leading the prayers

When World War II transitioned into the Chinese Civil War, the brothers had to leave their motherhouse in Anguo and move to the Monastery of the Beatitudes in Peking. The Chinese priest Alexander Cao became “Brother Servant”, the superior of the Little Brothers. The motherhouse was moved south to Hong Kong, where 13 brothers ministered to the many refugees fleeing the mainland. According to Alexander Cao, there were still over 50 religious behind “the bamboo curtain” in 1956, persecuted and in several instances killed by the Communists. These Little Brothers followed in the footsteps of the Chinese martyrs, the secondary patrons of their order. Like many other Catholic orders, the Little Brothers moved to Taiwan, establishing their motherhouse in Taichung in 1954. The Little Brothers are currently present in Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, and America.

If you would like to take a deeper dive into the history of this fascinating order, I warmly recommend Christian Monks on Chinese Soil by Matteo Nicolini-Zani. It was my main source for this article and contains a draft of the original rule as well as a chapter on the Little Sisters of Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, the female counterpart of the Little Brothers, also founded by Fr. Lebbe.

(All pictures from Whitworth University)