Saint Stephen Nguyễn Văn Vinh

Stephen Nguyễn Văn Vinh was born in 1813 in the village of Bồ Trang, Thái Bình province, into a poor family that did not follow the faith. He came to Kẻ Mốt to work as a hired hand and tenant farmer.

There he got to know the people of the Catholic parish. He began attending catechism classes and learned some prayers by heart. He was on his way to God, step by step.

From the same village of Bồ Trang came Augustine Nguyễn Văn Mới, also a hired laborer at Kẻ Mốt, who had been baptized earlier.

Soldiers surrounded the village of Kẻ Mốt, arrested Father Peter Nguyễn Văn Tự, and forced all the villagers to step over the cross.

Vinh had not yet been baptized. Strictly speaking, he was not yet a Catholic. But he stood before the soldiers and said:

“I would rather die than ever trample on the Holy Cross, because I know the religion of Jesus is the true religion.”

He was arrested like the other Catholics and taken to Bắc Ninh.

In the prison of Bắc Ninh, Father Tự baptized him. He chose the baptismal name Stephen, the name of the Church’s first martyr. Perhaps he already knew the road ahead of him.

The baptismal water was poured over his head not in a splendid church, but in a dark prison cell. And in that very place, the man who baptized him would go ahead of him.

In September 1838, Father Tự and the healer Joseph Hoàng Lương Cảnh were executed. Vinh remained in prison with four others: the catechists Francis Xavier Hà Trọng Mậu and Dominic Bùi Văn Úy, Augustine Mới and Thomas Nguyễn Văn Đệ.

The five asked together to join the Dominican Third Order. They studied the catechism and shared it with their fellow prisoners. The newly baptized man was now teaching the catechism to others. The five brothers helped forty-four people receive baptism right there in prison.

Think of that: a prison became a mission field. Men arrested for the faith brought the faith to those imprisoned with them.

Many times the mandarin brought them before the cross, promising release if they stepped over it. The five knelt down before the Holy Cross and prayed:

“O Lord! Save us; I entrust my soul into Your hands.”

The mandarin was so exasperated that he burst out:

“These people cannot be pardoned, and they do not even want to be!”

On December 19, 1839, Stephen Vinh was strangled at the Cổ Mễ execution ground, together with his four brothers. His body was taken to Hương La, in the parish of Tử Nê.

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

Vinh reminds us that faith does not begin on the day of baptism. It begins the moment a person recognizes that God is real and chooses to follow Him.

He professed the faith even before he was baptized. He taught the catechism when he had only just been baptized. He died for the faith after being a Christian for little more than a year. But in that year he lived the faith more fully than many who keep it all their lives.