On June 11 (June 24 on the civil calendar) The Church commemorates the hundreds of Chinese martyrs who victoriously contended for Christ in the Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Synaxarion of the Chinese Martyrs

Chinese Glory

By Bishop Joseph of Arianzhou

Rejoice, multitude of Chinese martyrs
The Living God’s brave array
Which strongly put down the Buddhist delusion and elevated Christ’s faith.
The flowers that breathe out the untold fragrance,
New stars of the intelligible firmament
Who illumine the hearts of the faithful.
The great boast of China, Asia’s ornament, decoration, and brightness
And the first sacrifice to the Lord:
Entreat Him to grant to our souls great mercy. (Stichiron)

11 June, 1900. A day of ruthless persecution of the few Christians of vast China. A day of wrath, fire, and tremors. The revolutionary Boxers turned their anger especially against the 700 Orthodox and struck with fury the “small flock of Christ”.

Perhaps they had many complaints against the foreigners and their missions which were not always exempt from worldly ambitions and expediencies. But the small Orthodox Church of China, a sacred offspring of the Russian missionary flame of older times, had very easily in its existence shown and proved that its concern and duty was exclusively to evangelise and spread the Kingdom of God and not the “religious” support of the political and other vain and sinful expediencies. So if others have afforded a pretext for suspicions and complaints, the Orthodox preached Christ Crucified and nothing else.

In the millions of Buddhists, Confucians, and Taoists, the Orthodox presence was a drop in the ocean. However this drop was unbearably annoying to the Boxers and they did not tolerate it to act as a medicine to the eyes of their souls to clear up their spiritual vision so that they could see the light of the true knowledge of God. So they were determined to die for it: By the fire of persecution; by the frightful wind of violence; by every possible manner.

Almost all the Churches were set on fire. The Missionary Centre of Peking, its invaluable library, its printing press, everything was in flames. Whatever the humble missionary endeavor managed to create was turned into ruins and ashes.

One of their first victims was the venerable priest Metrophanes Tsi. “I will strike the shepherd and the sheep of the flock will be scattered” (Matthew 26:31). His eight-year-old son, John, who was inexperienced in evil, suffered together with the priest. They mutilated him without pity.

“Do you deny your faith in Christ?”

“No.”

“Do you worship Buddha?”

“God forbid.”

They cut him up in pieces. While he was dying some felt sorry for him and tried to show him some humaneness. When they asked him if he suffered a lot, the holy child martyr whispered with an angelic smile, “It is not hard to suffer for Christ!”

Then he closed his innocent eyes to the barbarism of the earth to open them in the Kingdom of Heaven, where all the other children who died for Christ – such as Kyriakos, Tarsizios, Claudius, Hypatios, Dionysios, and Paul – were in a brotherly manner waiting for him to join them in their game, together with the Cherubim and Seraphim.

The time came for the catechist Paul Van to seal, with his confession and martyrdom for Christ, all that he was teaching to the youth of the Church for many years. Without the slightest groan, and with prayer on his lips, he endured unheard-of tortures and he surrendered his blessed soul to the hands of his Creator. Iyia Ven, a teacher at the missionary school, was repeatedly tortured inhumanely. She was bashed and mutilated, and in the end she died while confessing, with high spirit and courage, the name of Christ.

Many others suffered martyrdom with them. Young and old; Ordinary and important persons; educated and illiterate. People from rural and urban areas. Professionals and labourers. God knows their names and He has entered them in the book of life. About 400 persons, who loved Christ, distinguished themselves as martyrs and confessors and irrigated with their pure blood the ground of China and sanctified it with their supreme sacrifice. The previously barren and sterile Chinese land grew its first fragrant flowers which with their yellow colour enriched the beauty of the Garden of the heavenly Eden and with their freshness they refreshed Christianity which was fainting from the burns of rationalism and indifference at the beginning of our century. The historic people of China offered their first sacrifice to God Sabaoth.

11 June, 1900. Worthy is the sacrifice of the Chinese new-martyrs. Worthy is the blood-stained epitrachelion of presbyter Metrophanes. Worthy is the blameless slaughter of the little boy John. Worthy is the blood of Iyia, of Paul, and of all the known and unknown, but known to God by name, confessors and martyrs, the first sacrifices of the yellow Race.

11 June, 1995. Bent over the pages of the “Ecclesiastic Truth”, the official periodical of the Church of Constantinople of the year of the Lord 1901, I became acquainted for the first time with the Holy New-Martyrs of China. Their holy icon in Chino-Byzantine style already sanctifies my humble office.

Through their intercessions, Christ our Lord, raise the fallen tabernacle of Your Church in China, and save the souls of us Your servants who are lovers of the Martyrs.