Martyr 78 of 117 · Priest
Saint François Jaccard (Phan)
The student who once dropped out
1799 – 1838 · Feast day September 21
Priest, from France · French
As a boy, François was a very slow learner, so bad at remembering his lessons that he had to leave the seminary and go home to farm. Everyone thought the road to the priesthood had closed for him. But he came back, and later became the teacher of so many young Vietnamese.
From the fields of Savoy
François Jaccard was born in 1799 in the region of Savoy, France. His first years of study did not go well. He found it hard to remember, forgetting what he had learned as soon as he moved on. In the end he left the seminary and went home to farm.
But his friends would not let him give up. They encouraged him and urged him to try again. François asked to resume his studies, this time with more perseverance. Then he joined the Paris Foreign Missions Society, was ordained a priest, and in 1826 set foot in Vietnam.
The young man once thought too slow to learn went on to master Vietnamese, a difficult language for Westerners, and took the Vietnamese name Phan.
The teacher at An Ninh
He served at Nhu Lý and Phủ Cam, and then taught at the seminary of An Ninh. The student who had once dropped out now stood before a class teaching others. Perhaps because he had struggled so much with learning himself, he understood and loved the slower seminarians, and was more patient with them.
Twists and turns
Father Phan’s life had a great many twists and turns. Emperor Minh Mạng’s court once kept him in Huế to translate documents and maps and to teach French. He was valued for his talents, but forbidden to preach.
Then he was accused of preaching illegally and sentenced to death. The sentence was commuted to exile at Lao Bảo, a harsh mountain and forest region. Afterward he was called back again to work as a translator.
During those years he wrote to his mother at home:
“In a short while I will no longer have to suffer; I long to die for the holy faith in this country.”
With a young seminarian
In 1838 the seminary of Di Loan was searched. The mandarins suspected he was connected to it and took him to Quảng Trị. He admitted he had sent religious books for teaching. He was given forty strokes of the rod and left in the sun until dusk.
In prison he met the seminarian Thomas Trần Văn Thiện, a young man of only eighteen. The teacher, nearly forty, and the young student held each other up. He said to Thiện:
“Whatever happens, we must stay steadfast to the end.”
Nhan Biều, September 21
On September 21, 1838, Father Phan and the seminarian Thiện were strangled at the Nhan Biều execution ground. Teacher and student died on the same day.
His remains were later taken to the chapel of the Paris Foreign Missions Society.
At home in Savoy, when she received the news that her son had died, his mother said:
“This is truly good news: our family has a martyr.”
He was beatified on May 27, 1900, and canonized on June 19, 1988. His own feast day is September 21.
No one is too slow
If you have ever felt slower than others, have failed, have had to leave something unfinished, remember Father Phan. The boy who could not remember his lessons became a priest, a translator for the court, a teacher of seminarians, and in the end a saint.
God does not choose the most gifted. He chooses those who know how to get up and keep walking. And sometimes He sends friends who know how to encourage us at the right moment.
Biography on the website of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Vietnam ↗