Saint Thomas Đào Đình Toán

Thomas Đào Đình Toán was born in 1764 in the village of Cần Phán, Thái Bình province. He joined the Dominican Third Order and served as a catechist at Trung Linh, Nam Định. His whole life was bound up with teaching the catechism, visiting families and helping the community. The people of Trung Linh respected him for his standing and his devotion.

Many generations of children in Trung Linh probably learned their prayers and catechism from him. He taught them to venerate the cross, taught them to be faithful to God.

On December 16, 1839, in the reign of Emperor Minh Mạng, the prefect of Xuân Trường brought troops to search the village of Trung Linh. Toán was arrested.

The mandarin ordered him to step over the cross. At first he refused. Then the beatings rained down, day after day. He was seventy-five, his body already worn out. On January 19, 1840, he could bear it no longer. He stepped over.

Then another time, when the mandarin threatened that many others would have to die, when insults against the faith rang in his ears, he stepped over again.

Think of the pain he felt afterward. The man who had taught so many children to venerate the cross had now trampled on it himself. No beating hurts as much as that.

In prison he met Father Dominic Trạch, a priest who was also being held. Father Trạch comforted him and heard his confession. And from that meeting, Toán made up his mind: he would profess his faith again, whatever the cost.

The next time the soldiers dragged him across the cross, he pulled himself up, knelt down and kissed the image of the Lord.

The mandarin was furious. They beat him, tied the cross to his feet, left him in the sun, starved him. Then the governor had meat and wine laid out before the starving old man. He had only to give up his faith to eat. Toán answered:

“If eating means renouncing my religion, I will never eat at all.”

He did not live to see the day of execution. On June 27, 1840, the catechist Thomas Toán breathed his last in the prison of Nam Định, from hunger, from the beatings, from old age. He was seventy-six.

The faithful took his body to be buried at Lục Thủy.

He was beatified on May 27, 1900, and canonized on June 19, 1988. His own feast day is June 27.

The Church does not hide the two times Toán fell. And neither should we. It is those very falls that make his return so moving.

It was not one moment when everything was suddenly wiped clean. It was a long road: pain, remorse, a helping hand, getting up, and then holding out until his last breath.

If you have ever been weak, have ever done what you knew was wrong, remember the old catechist of Trung Linh. At seventy-six, he still had time to come back. And God still welcomed him home as a saint.