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Between 1820 and 1862, St. Andrew Dũng Lạc was one of 117 people martyred in Vietnam. Members of this group were beatified on four different occasions between 1900 and 1951. Now all have been canonized by Pope John Paul II. Christianity came to Vietnam (then three separate kingdoms) through the Portuguese. Jesuits opened the first permanent mission at Đà Nẵng in 1615. The king of one of the kingdoms banned all foreign missionaries and tried to make all Vietnamese deny their faith by trampling on a crucifix. Like the priest-holes in Ireland during English persecution, many hiding places were offered in homes of the faithful. Severe persecutions were again launched three times in the 19th century. During the six decades after 1820, between 100,000 and 300,000 Catholics were killed or subjected to great hardship. Foreign missionaries martyred in the first wave included priests of the Paris Mission Society, and Spanish Dominican priests and tertiaries. Persecution broke out again in 1847 when the emperor suspected foreign missionaries and Vietnamese Christians of sympathizing with a rebellion led by of one of his sons. The last of the martyrs were 17 laypersons, one of them a 9-year-old, executed in 1862. That year a treaty with France guaranteed religious freedom to Catholics, but it did not stop all persecution.

By 1954 there were over a million and a half Catholics—about seven percent of the population—in the north. Persistent persecution forced some 670,000 Catholics to abandon lands, homes and possessions and flee to the south. In 1964, there were still 833,000 Catholics in the north, but many were in prison. In the south, Catholics were enjoying the first decade of religious freedom in centuries, their numbers swelled by refugees. During the Vietnam War, Catholics again suffered in the north, and again moved to the south in great numbers. Now the whole country is under Communist rule.

Thus every year, the Vietnamese Catholic Faithful in Wichita gathered together to pray through the intercession of the Vietnamese Martyrs to help Vietnam soon to obtain religious freedom and end religious persecutions for all in Vietnam and abroad. The Vietnamese Martyrs exemplified the ultimate love Christ has given us and we need to stand together to uphold the only truth.

“The Church in Vietnam is alive and vigorous, blessed with strong and faithful bishops, dedicated religious, and courageous and committed laypeople.... The Church in Vietnam is living out the gospel in a difficult and complex situation with remarkable persistence and strength” (statement of three U.S. archbishops returning from Vietnam in January 1989).