Flora Cantábrica

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Magdalena of Nagasaki, Saint
.Virgin and Martyr
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Roman Martyrology: In Nagasaki, Japan, Saint Magdalene, virgin and martyr, who, in the time of Emperor Yemitsu, was strong in spirit both in maintaining the faith and in enduring the torture of hanging for thirteen days (1634).
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Daughter of nobles and fervent Christians, she was born in 1611 near the Japanese city of Nagasaki. Ancient sources say that she was a beautiful woman with a delicate constitution. Because of her Catholic faith, her parents and siblings had been sentenced to death and martyred when she was still very young.
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In 1624, she met two Augustinian Recollects, Fathers Francisco de Jesús and Vicente de San Antonio, who had arrived in Japan a few months earlier. Attracted by the profound spirituality of both missionaries, she consecrated herself to God as an Augustinian Recollect tertiary. From that moment on, her gala dress was the tertiary habit, and her greatest concern was prayer, reading religious books and apostolate.
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Times were difficult. The persecution that intensified against Christians was becoming more systematic and cruel every day. Magdalena taught catechism to children and asked for alms from Portuguese merchants on behalf of the poor. In 1629, she took refuge with Fathers Francis and Vincent and several hundred Christians in the mountains of Nagasaki. In November of that same year, the two missionaries were captured, and she remained hidden, enduring suffering and hardship with serene joy. She instilled courage to remain firm in the faith, she encouraged those who had renounced Christ out of fear or weakness, she visited the sick, she baptized newborns and she had a word of encouragement for everyone.
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In view of the frequent apostasies of Christians terrified by the torture to which they were subjected and desirous of uniting themselves forever with Christ, Magdalene decided to challenge the tyrants. Dressed in her tertiary habit, in September 1634, she appeared before the judges. She carried with her a small bundle full of religious books to pray and read in prison. Neither promises of an advantageous marriage nor torture managed to break her will.
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At the beginning of October, she was subjected to the torment of the forca or fossa. Suspended by her feet, with her head and chest inserted into a cavity covered with boards to make her breathing even more difficult, the brave young woman invoked the names of Jesus and Mary during her martyrdom, and sang hymns to the Lord. . She resisted this torment for thirteen days, until one night a heavy rain flooded the grave and the martyr drowned. The executioners burned her body and scattered the ashes in the sea so that the Christians would not preserve her relics. …………
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Beatified in 1981, she was canonized by John Paul II on October 18, 1987 along with 15 other martyrs in Japan.
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