Saints John de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues, Priests, and Companions

Martyrs

Feast Day

October 19

Life

1593–1649

Canonized

1930

Order

Society of Jesus (Jesuits)

Born

Condé-sur-Vire, Normandy, France (Brébeuf); Orléans, France (Jogues)

The eight North American Martyrs were six French Jesuit priests and two lay donnés (lay associates) who served the Huron and Iroquois missions of New France between 1626 and 1649. The principal figures are Saint Jean de Brébeuf, the great evangelist of the Hurons, who composed the first Huron grammar and the celebrated Huron Carol, and Saint Isaac Jogues, who labored among the Mohawks.

Jogues was captured by the Mohawks in 1642 with the lay donnés Saint René Goupil (martyred 29 September 1642) and the future Saint Jean de Lalande, savagely tortured, and held as a slave for thirteen months before being rescued by Dutch traders at Fort Orange (Albany). He returned to France, where Pope Urban VIII granted him a unique permission to celebrate Mass with his mutilated hands (Indignum esset Christi martyrem Christi non bibere sanguinem). Returning to New France, he reentered Mohawk territory in 1646 on a peace mission and was tomahawked at Ossernenon (modern Auriesville, New York) on 18 October 1646; Lalande was killed the following day.

In March 1649 a war party of nearly a thousand Iroquois invaded Huronia. Brébeuf and his companion Saint Gabriel Lalemant were captured at Saint-Ignace, tortured for many hours and killed; Brébeuf on 16 March, Lalemant on 17 March 1649. The Jesuit Saints Antoine Daniel (4 July 1648), Charles Garnier (7 December 1649) and Noël Chabanel (8 December 1649) completed the eight martyrs.

Pope Pius XI canonized the eight on 29 June 1930. Their Memorial is observed on 19 October in the United States and on 26 September in Canada.