An African triumph.

The Ugandan martyrs (1886)

In the calendar of saints, June 3rd celebrates the feast day of Charles Lwanga and companions. Their martyrdom in 1886 in what is now Uganda is one of the most relevant of our times: they resisted the homosexual lust of their king and died martyrs to the Catholic faith as a consequence. They gave their young lives in defence of truth and the common good of society. (The king also put some Anglican court pages to death.) What a reproach to our wimpish society and what a model for young people today! The Church provides us with these saints so that we may seek their assistance in upholding the truth.

It has been said that, without God, man becomes a plaything of the state or a slave to force. This adage was certainly true in the 1880s in Raganda, a province of Uganda in Central East Africa.

Up until the 1500s, the people had an idea of a creator and a redeemer. They tried to live moral lives but gradually a superstitious idolatry crept in and became the state religion. The idea of a creator was abandoned and gradually the king, the Kabaka, became an absolute monarch with complete control over his subjects, literally in both body and soul. They existed purely for his pleasure and his interests.

In 1879, the French missionary order of the White Fathers came to Raganda and were welcomed by the Kabaka, who saw an opportunity of playing politics among the Arabs, the English and the French. He permitted the French priests, led by Father Lourdel, to hold catechism lessons, and organized the building of a house for him.

From one of the Kabaka's young pages, Father Lourdel heard for the first time a tale that he was to hear again and again from others: "The Islam religion appeared first. According to Islam, the greatest crime could be erased by washing in either water or sand--thus one would return to one's innocence. Then the English Protestants came, and I began to listen to them. They said: Sin, but believe. Neither set my heart at rest. They cannot have the truth. I believe they are wrong."

Another catechist said that his father had believed that the Ragandans did not have the truth, but that one day men would come to teach them the right way.

After Father Lourdel helped cure the Kabaka of dysentery, Christianity seemed on the ascendant. However, some rash remarks by an Anglican minister gave the Arabs a handle to stir up trouble. They urged the Kabaka to declare Islam the state religion and order the whole court to attend at the mosque. Those who refused, they said, were traitors and should be executed.

Thereupon Father Lourdel rushed to the Kabaka and on bended knees urged him to reconsider, saying, "God wants free service." In response, the Arabs accused the white man of wanting to take over the country. Father Lourdel rose to his feet and holding his Bible aloft shouted, "The Arabs say the Christian religion is a lie and theirs is the truth. Let God be the judge. Light a blazing fire and I will pass through the fire holding the Bible. Let the Arabs do the same with the Koran. He whom God spares, is the true messenger of God."

When the Arabs refused this test, complaining of witchcraft, Fr. Lourdel was left the victor for a time. In 1880, he baptized nine natives.

The French priests were absolutely amazed at the progress made by these lay catechists. They talked like theologians, yet explained the great truths so simply that all could understand. It seemed that people close to nature and not bound up with materialism have no obstacles in accepting the truth when it is presented. St. Francis Xavier made similar comments about the Asian Indians and the Japanese, as did the Jesuits in Quebec about the American Indians.

The blood of martyrs

However, the Kabaka was not pleased when the Catholic pages refused to comply with his homosexual lust. "My pages obeyed me before the priests came," he complained.

Five years later, in 1885, he finally flew into a rage, ordering the execution of his chief page, Joseph Mukasa. Mukasa joyfully went to his execution, refusing to be bound, saying, "I will not run away. A Christian who loves Jesus Christ is not afraid to die."

The blood of martyrs proved to be the seed of the Ugandan church. In the confusion following the execution, while the Kabaka slept in a drunken stupor, twenty royal pages rushed to the Catholic mission crying, "Baptize us! Death is so close. Do not let us enter heaven without the sacrament!"

Father Lourdel gave some final instructions before baptizing them. They then received their First Holy Communion. After hurried congratulations, the young men hastened back to the palace, bracing themselves for whatever would come.

Their time of trial occurred very soon afterwards. The next day the Kabaka assembled all the pages and ordered those who prayed to step forward. All did, except three. The Kabaka then strode around threatening and haranguing them, but, getting tired, decided to release them. This did nothing to reassure the pages. Forty of them arrived at Father Lourdel's that evening demanding baptism. The example of these young men, in turn, attracted crowds of adults who previously had shown no interest in Catholicism.

On May 22, 1886, at a grand banquet in his honour, a visiting trader asked for a certain page. When the page refused to come, the Kabaka brooded for two days, then flew into a rage, ordering the execution of all the Christian pages.

The chief page, Charles Lwanga, gathered his charges and told them to run and hide. They refused, saying it would be like denying their Faith. "Let us stand together for Christ," they chorused. Only one was sent out to warn Father Lourdel and the other Christians. Father Lourdel came immediately to offer his life in exchange for the pages, but the offer was refused.

Usually, the condemned had to be dragged to the place of execution by soldiers the whole distance of forty miles. But in this case, the pages walked the long road in triumph. On arrival, the victims had to wait a week in the stocks for the one hundred state executioners to gather. They bided their time by shouting catechism questions and answers back and forth, singing hymns and, by turns, praying the Rosary out loud.

Early on the morning of the Feast of the Ascension, June 3, 1886, the hundred executioners swooped down for the ritual proceedings. Usually those to be put to death would attempt to escape. But these victims greeted each other joyfully, walking serenely to the place of execution. Charles Lwanga went first. He was slowly roasted to death. They slowed the fire to prolong the agony. Not a word escaped his lips until, with one final exclamation, he called on God.

The remaining pages were offered freedom if they rejected Christianity. They would not recant. They were wrapped in reed mats and placed in the fire. Instead of screams, murmured prayers came from their lips. Impressed by their courage, the bystanders realized that it was not their licentious ruler but these brave young men who had triumphed in the end. It was an Mrican triumph in the line of the earlier North African martyrs of the Apostolic and post-Apostolic times.

Patricia Doyne is a freelance writer from Barrie, ON