Sts. John de Brébeuf & Isaac Jogues

Eight French Jesuits and lay donnés who labored among the Huron and Mohawk peoples of New France between 1625 and 1649. Six were tortured and killed by Iroquois war parties; two died of disease contracted in their service. Isaac Jogues, captured and mutilated, was ransomed by Dutch settlers, returned to Europe, and went back to the missions where he was tomahawked at Auriesville. They are co-patrons of Canada.

Jean de Brébeuf, the towering figure among them, spent twenty years among the Huron, learning their language, compiling a dictionary, and composing the beloved Huron Carol — one of the first Christmas hymns written in North America. He was captured by Iroquois warriors in 1649 and subjected to hours of torture, including being doused with boiling water in mockery of baptism, yet witnesses reported he never cried out.

The eight martyrs were canonized together by Pope Pius XI in 1930. Their feast on October 19 is a reminder of the extraordinary price the early missionaries paid to bring the Gospel to the New World. The shrine at Midland, Ontario, and the shrine at Auriesville, New York, draw pilgrims to the places where their blood was spilled — ground that the Church holds sacred.