Click Link for a reel of Daily Dose of Saints and Faithful Art:

https://youtube.com/shorts/gkhO-s9Eq2w?feature=share

Fellow Pilgrims in Christ,

Imagine living in a time when simply professing Christ could cost you everything — your family, your freedom, and even your life. This was the reality for St. Lorenzo Ruiz, a humble man from Binondo, Manila, who became the first canonized Filipino saint.

Born in the early 1600s to a Chinese father and Tagalog mother, Lorenzo grew up in a devout Catholic household. He was educated by the Dominican friars, served as an altar boy, and became a member of the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, which deepened his Marian devotion. He worked as a skilled calligrapher and clerk, married a woman named Rosario, and together they had three children — a quiet, ordinary Christian family life.

In 1636, Lorenzo was falsely accused of a crime and fled the Philippines with three Dominican priests, a Japanese priest, and a lay catechist. Their journey took them to Okinawa, Japan — a place where Christians were hunted and executed under the Tokugawa shogunate’s fierce persecution.

The group was quickly arrested, tortured, and brought before officials. The demand was simple: renounce Christ or die.

Lorenzo’s reply has echoed through the centuries:

“I am a Catholic and wholeheartedly do accept death for God;
Had I a thousand lives, all these to Him shall I offer.”

Lorenzo endured tsurushi — the gallows-and-pit torture — hung upside down until he died from suffocation and bleeding. His faith never wavered. He was martyred in 1637 alongside his companions, sealing his testimony with his blood.

Lorenzo lived at a time when the Church was spreading rapidly in Asia through Dominican, Jesuit, and Franciscan missionaries. At the same time, Japan was closing its borders and attempting to eradicate Christianity. Lorenzo’s death became a bridge between the young Church in the Philippines and the persecuted Church in Japan — a sign of the universality of the Catholic faith.

In 1981, Pope John Paul II beatified Lorenzo Ruiz in Manila — the first beatification held outside Rome — and in 1987, he was canonized as the first Filipino saint. Today, St. Lorenzo Ruiz is a patron for overseas Filipino workers and migrants, inspiring courage, fidelity, and trust in God’s providence no matter where life takes us.

Lorenzo’s life reminds us that holiness is possible even in the ordinary routines of work and family. When trials come, his words call us to courage: we are Catholic, and even if we had a thousand lives, all belong to God.