Pedro Calungsod
Saint
Pedro Calungsod also known
as Pedro Calonsor (born: 1654 – died: 2 April 1672) was a young Roman Catholic Filipino saint,
migrant,sacristan and missionary catechist, who along with Blessed Diego Luis de San
Vitores, suffered religious persecution and martyrdom in Guam for their missionary work in 1672.
While in Guam,
Calungsod preached Christianity to
the Chamorro people through catechism, while baptizing both infants, children
and adults at the risk and expense of being persecuted and eventually murdered.
Through Calungsod and San Vitores' missionary efforts, many native Chamorrosconverted to Roman Catholicism.
Calungsod
was formally beatified on
5 March 2000 by Blessed Pope John
Paul II. Calungsod was officially canonized by Pope Benedict XVI at Saint Peter's
Basilica in Vatican City on
21 October 2012.
Early years and Missionary work
Calungsod
(spelled Calonsor in Spanish records) was born ca. 1654.
Historical records never mentioned his exact place of origin and merely
identified him as "Pedro Calonsor, El Visayo". Historical research
identifiesGinatilan in Cebu, Hinunangan and Hinundayan in Southern Leyte, and Molo district in Iloilo as
probable places of origin. Loboc in Bohol also makes a claim. These
locations were parts of the "Diocese
of Cebu" during the time of Calungsod's martyrdom.
Few
details of his early life prior to missionary work and death are known. It is
probable that he received basic education at a Jesuit boarding school,
mastering the Catechism and
learning to communicate inSpanish.
He likely honed his skills in drawing, painting, singing, acting, and carpentry
as these were necessary in missionary work. Calungsod would have been expected
to have some aptitude in serving in the Tridentine Mass (now known as the Extraordinary
form of the Roman Rite).
Calungsod,
then around 14, was among the exemplary young catechists chosen to accompany
the Jesuits in their mission to the Ladrones Islands (Islas de los Ladrones or “Isles of Thieves”). In 1668,
Calungsod travelled with Spanish Jesuit missionaries to these islands, renamed
the Mariana Islands (Las Islas de Mariana) the year
before in honour of both the Blessed Virgin Mary and of the Queen Regent of Spain,María Ana of Austria,
who funded their voyage. Calungsod and San Vitores went to Guam to catechise the
native Chamorros.
Missionary
life was difficult as provisions did not arrive regularly, the jungles and
terrain was difficult to traverse, and the islands were frequently devastated
by typhoons. Despite all these, the mission persevered, and was able to convert
a significant number of locals.
Martyrdom
A Chinese
named Choco, a criminal from Manila who was exiled in Guam began spreading rumours
that the baptismal water used by missionaries was poisonous. As some sickly Chamorro infants
who were baptized eventually died, many believed the story and held the missionaries
responsible. Choco was readily supported by the macanjas (medicine men) and the urritaos (young males) who despised the
missionaries.
In their
search for a runaway companion named Esteban, Calungsod and San Vitores came to
the village of Tumon, Guam on 2 April 1672. There they learnt
that the wife of the village chief Matapang gave
birth to a daughter, and they immediately went to baptise the child. Influenced
by the calumnies of Choco, the chief strongly opposed; to give Mata'pang some time to calm
down, the missionaries gathered the children and some adults of the village at
the nearby shore and started chanting with them the tenets of the Catholic
religion. They invited Mata'pang to join them, but he shouted back that he was
angry with God and was fed up with Christian teachings.
Determined
to kill the missionaries, Mata'pang went away and tried to enlist another
villager, named Hirao, who was not a Christian. Hirao initially refused,
mindful of the missionaries' kindness towards the natives, but when Mata'pang
branded him a coward, he became piqued and capitulated. Meanwhile, during that
brief absence of Mata'pang from his hut, San Vitores and Calungsod baptised the
baby girl, with the consent of her Christian mother.
When
Mata'pang learnt of his daughter's baptism, he became even more furious. He
violently hurled spears first at Pedro, who was able to dodge the spears.
Witnesses claim that Calungsod could have escaped the attack, but did not want
to leave San Vitores alone. Those who knew Calungsod personally meanwhile
believed that he could have defeated the aggressors with weapons; San Vitores
however banned his companions to carry arms. Calungsod was hit in the chest by
a spear and he fell to the ground, then Hirao immediately charged towards him
and finished him off with machete blow to the head. San Vitores absolved Calungsod
before he too was killed.
Mata'pang
took San Vitores' crucifix and pounded it with a stone whilst blaspheming God.
Both assassins then denuded the corpses of Calungsod and San Vitroes, tied
large stones to their feet, brought them out to sea on their proas and threw them into the water.
The Catholic Church considers Calungsod's martyrdom as committed In Odium Fidei ('In Hatred of the Faith'), referring to the religious persecution endured by the person in evangelisation.
Beatification
A month after the
martyrdom of San Vitores and Calungsod, a process for beatification was
initiated but only for San Vitores. Political and religious turmoil, however,
delayed and halted the process. When Hagåtña was preparing for its 20th anniversary as a diocese in 1981, the 1673 beatification cause of Padre
Diego Luís de San Vitores was rediscovered in old manuscripts and revived until
San Vitores was finally beatified on 6 October 1985. This gave recognition to
Calungsod, paving the way for his own beatification.
In 1980, then-Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal asked permission from the Vatican to initiate
the beatification and canonisation cause of Pedro Calungsod. In March 1997, the Sacred
Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the acta of the diocesan beatification process. That same
year, Cardinal Vidal appointed Fr Ildebrando Leyson as vice-postulator for the
cause, tasked with compiling a Positio Super Martyrio (position regarding the martyrdom) to be
scrutinised by the Congregation. The positio, which relied heavily
on the documentation of San Vitores' beatification, was completed in 1999.
Wanting to include young
Asian laypersons in his first beatification for the Jubilee Year 2000, John
Paul II paid particular attention to the cause of Calungsod. In January 2000,
he approved the decree super martyrio (concerning the martyrdom) of Calungsod, setting
his beatification for 5 March 2000 at Saint Peter's Square in Rome.
Regarding Calungsod's
charitable works and virtuous deeds, Pope John Paul II declared:
“
|
...From his childhood,
Pedro Calungsod declared himself unwaveringly for Christ and responded
generously to his call. Young people today can draw encouragement and
strength from the example of Pedro, whose love of Jesus inspired him to
devote his teenage years to teaching the faith as a lay catechist. Leaving
family and friends behind, Pedro willingly accepted the challenge put to him
by Fr. Diego de San Vitores to join him on the Mission to the Chamorros. In a spirit of faith, marked by strong
Eucharistic and Marian devotion, Pedro undertook the demanding work asked of him and bravely
faced the many obstacles and difficulties he met. In the face of imminent
danger, Pedro would not forsake Fr. Diego, but as a "good soldier of
Christ" preferred to die at the missionary's side.
|
”
|
Shortly before his
scheduled canonisation, a Triduum of masses in honour of
Calungsod were celebrated in the Basilica of Saint
Augustine, the Church of the Gesù and the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary
Major from 18-20 October. A
wooden image of Calungsod approved by and flown in from the Archdiocese of Cebu was displayed for public veneration. Archbishop
Emeritus of Manila, Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales presided over the 20 October mass, while Philippine
Vice-President Jejomar Binay led the Philippine
delegation along with Ambassador to the Holy See, Mercedes Arrastia
Tuason. Filipino Cardinal Ricardo Jamin Vidal concelebrated with Pope Benedict XVI at the official canonisation Mass for Calungsod
and other beatified candidates at Saint Peter's Square.
Sainthood
On 19
December 2011, the Holy See officially
approved the miracle qualifying
Calungsod for sainthood by
the Roman Catholic Church. The
recognised miracle dates
from 26 March 2003, when a woman from Leyte who was pronounced clinically dead by accredited physicians two
hours after a heart attack was
revived when an attending physician invoked Calungsod's intercession.
Cardinal Angelo Amato presided
over the declaration ceremony on behalf of the Congregation
for the Causes of Saints. He later revealed that Pope Benedict XVI approved and signed the official
promulgation decrees recognising the miracles as authentic and worthy of
belief. The College of Cardinals were then sent a dossier on the new saints,
and they were asked to indicate their approval. On 18 February 2012, after the
Consistory for the Creation of Cardinals, Cardinal Amato formally petitioned
Pope Benedict XVI to announce the canonization of the new saints.The Pope set
the date for the canonisation on 21 October 2012 (World Mission Sunday), 340
years after Calungsod's death.
On 21
October 2012, Pope Benedict XVI canonized Calungsod along with Saints Kateri Tekakwitha, Marianne Cope, Anna Schaffer, Giovanni
Battista Piamartaa, Jacques Berthieu and Carmen Salles y Barangueras. Of note is that among the seven new
saints canonised, Calungsod was the only one without a first class relic
exposed for veneration since his body was disposed of at sea. After Saint Lorenzo Ruiz, Calungsod is the second Filipino
to be declared a saint by the Roman Catholic Church. The Roman Martyrology celebrates Calungsod's feast along
with Blessed Diego Luis de San
Vitores every 2 April.
Birthplace issue
Various
areas in the Visayan islands make
the claim from which Pedro Calungsod was born and raised. An extensive research
provided by the census research of Ginatilan, Cebu provided
a longstanding record of Calonsor and Calungsod natives from their area, from which a
strong claim had the most Calungsod natives originating since Filipino-Spanish
era since the late 1700's. According to the Parish Pastoral Council William
Pancho of Ginatilan, Cebu, there is a strong claim that in the mid 1600's,
there were three Calungsod brothers:
- Valerio Calungsor who migrated to Iloilo
- Casimiro Calungsor who migrated to Bohol
- Pablo Calungsor who remained in Ginatilan, Cebu and was the father of Pedro Calungsod.
In a pubic
televised interview with ABS-CBN chief
correspondent and newscaster Korina Sanchez, Cardinal Ricardo Jamin Vidal emphasized his dismay that when the
original beatification of Pedro Calungsod began in 1980's, no province except
for Ginatilan, Cebu wanted to make a claim on his place of birth. Consequently,
when the canonization was approved, Catholic bishops from the provinces of Cebu, Bohol, Leyte, Samar,
and Iloilo and various Mindanao provinces
wanted to claim Calungsod's official birthplace.
As a
result, Cardinal Vidal ruled that he will not establish a definitive judgment
on his birthplace, since Spanish records only indicate the words "Pedro
Calonsor, El Visayo" as his native description. Furthermore, he stated
that all Visayan provinces were under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Cebu during the Filipino-Spanish era.
Iconography
It is not
known exactly what Calungsod looked like, as no contemporary depictions survive.
The writer Alcina, who was a contemporary of Pedro Calungsod, described the
male Visayan indios of
his time as usually more corpulent, better built and somewhat taller than the Tagalogs in Luzon;
that their skin was light brown in color; that their faces were usually round
and of fine proportions; that their noses were flat; that their eyes and hair
were black; that they— especially the youth—wore their hair a little bit long;
and that they already started to wear camisas (shirts) and calzones (knee-breeches). Pedro Chirino, S.J.,
who also worked in the Visayas in the 1590s, similarly described the Visayans
as well-built, of pleasing countenance and light-skinned.
Calungsod
is often depicted as a teenaged young man wearing a camisa de chino that is sometimes bloodied, and
usually dark loose trousers. His most popular attributes are the martyr's palm pressed to his chest and the Doctrina Christiana.
To indicate his missionary status, he is depicted in mid-stride, occasionally
also bearing a rosary or
crucifix. In some early statues, Calungsod is sometimes shown with a spear and catana (cutlass), the instruments of his
death.
In art
The first
portraits of Pedro Calungsod were drawings done by award-winning artist,
sculptor, and designer Eduardo Castrillo in
1994 for the Heritage of Cebu Monument in Parian. A bronze statue of Calungsod
was made and now forms part of the monument. Sculptors Francisco dela Victoria
and Vicente Gulane of Cebu and Justino Cagayat Jr. of Paete, Laguna, created statues of Calungsod in 1997
and 1999 respectively.
When the Archdiocese of Manila in 1998 published the pamphlet Pedro Calungsod: Young Visayan
"Proto-Martyr" by
Jesuit theologian Catalino Arevalo, the 17-year old Ronald Tubid of Oton, Iloilo, was chosen to model for a portrait of
Calungsod. This
then became the basis for Rafael del Casal's painting in 1999, which was chosen
as the official portrait for Calungsod. The Del Casal portrait is the first to
feature a Christogram, the seal of theSociety of Jesus with
which he was affiliated. The original painting is now enshrined at the
Archdiocesan Shrine of Blessed Pedro Calungsod in Cebu City.
Several
statues of Calungsod were also commissioned for the beatification, with one
brought to Rome and blessed by John Paul II. This became the "Pilgrim
Image", now enshrined at the Archdiocesan Shrine of Nuestro Padré Jesús de
Nazareno of the Society of the Angel of Peace in Cansojong, Talisay City, Cebu.
Another image is permanently enshrined at the Archdiocesan Shrine of Blessed
Pedro Calungsod in Cebu City. Both images also depict Calungsod wearing a white camisa and trousers, with his characteristic
palm, a rosary, and a crucifix pressed to his breast. During the novena before his feast day, a replica of the catana used to kill him is set into the arm
of the statue.
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