Saint Dominic Vũ (Phan) Đức Trạch

Dominic Vũ Đức Trạch (some documents give his family name as Phan) was born in 1793 in the Catholic community of Ngoại Vối, Ngoại Bồi parish, Nam Định province. As a small boy he lived at the presbytery, and then entered the seminary. At about thirty he was ordained a priest. In 1825 he made his vows as a Dominican.

By then he already had tuberculosis. The disease clung to him for the years that followed. But he did not give up his work because of it.

He once had charge of the parish of Quần Cống. Then, when his health declined, he went to Lục Thủy to recover. But recovering did not mean sitting still. There he guided the seminarians.

Picture it: a frail priest, coughing now and then, still sitting and teaching young men. Perhaps his very weakness was the greatest lesson for the seminarians: service does not need to wait until you are strong.

In 1839 he was arrested at Ngọc Cục. But the faithful raised money and ransomed him. He escaped that time.

He moved to another hiding place. But then he set out again, because two priests at Ngưỡng Nhân needed a visit. On April 11, 1840, on the way, he was arrested again.

This time no one could ransom him.

The mandarin questioned him about the hiding place of Father Hermosilla, a Spanish missionary. He did not tell.

The mandarin promised to release him if he stepped over the cross. He answered:

“Your Excellency, if you want eternal life, please venerate this Cross.”

Instead of stepping over it, he invited the mandarin himself to venerate the Cross. An invitation full of compassion.

The soldiers carried him, cangue and all, meaning to drag him across the holy image. He drew up his feet, not letting them touch it.

About his illness, he said:

“My body is weak and sick, but I neither fear nor complain at being arrested for the faith.”

From Xuân Trường he was taken to Nam Định to await the review of his sentence. In prison he met other priests who were being held. He also met an old catechist, the catechist Thomas Đào Đình Toán, who had twice weakened and stepped over the cross. He comforted the old man and heard his confession. And from that meeting, the catechist Toán rose again and professed his faith until his death.

A sick man helped another to get back on his feet.

On September 18, 1840, Father Dominic Trạch was led to the Bảy Mẫu execution ground. Before leaving, he said to the two priests, his fellow prisoners, who remained:

“Fathers, stay here in peace; I am going ahead to receive my reward, and soon we shall meet in the Kingdom of Heaven.”

The faithful took his body to be buried at the seminary of Lục Thủy, where he had taught the seminarians.

He was beatified on May 27, 1900, and canonized on June 19, 1988. His own feast day is September 18.

Father Trạch shows that one does not need to be healthy to do God’s work. A priest with tuberculosis still taught seminarians, still set out to visit his brothers, still lifted up a man who had lost heart in prison.

Saint Paul once wrote: “When I am weak, then I am strong.” Father Trạch lived exactly that.