Jan 12 John Gaspard Cratz, S.J.

Jack and Thom
Good morning, I love you

A day of two Johns – like Jack’s name and confirmation name. I thought it a bit unusual at the time [I still think it’s unusual] but it was ok with the Dominicans and with so many John saints to be patron, a double John seemed like a belts and suspenders approach to spiritual protection and inspiration.


January 12
John Gaspard Cratz sj d. 1737

How does a young German in early eighteenth century Cologne wind up in Macao joining the Jesuits? There’s a story about Cardinal Spellman and his almost joining the Jesuits: three times. One time he rode on the train with a particularly holy guy on his way to the novitiate. One time it was a particularly smart guy. The third time it was a particularly accomplished guy. Each time the man who became archbishop of New York - believed by many to be holy, brilliant, and accomplished – turned around because he did not believe he could live up to such extraordinary confreres. I know I followed a call into the Jesuit novitiate believing that is from where I could best serve children – as priest and teacher in the Church’s marines. I wish we had in the bioblurb John Cratz’s inspiration that took him to Macao, the Jesuits, and on to China. Do your own story for him or look it up, like I didn’t for this entry, in the Jesuit saints/blessed/venerables book right over there on the window sill beside my bed.

John Cratz joined the Jesuits in Macao in 1730. From there he went to China. Think Francis Xavier, S.J. (d. 1552; feast day 12/3, two days after Edmund Campion, d. 1581. The Jesuits had more than our fair share of saints in the early days. And not a shortage of them still. But I digress.) The pipeline of Jesuits from Europe to China has not stopped for over four hundred years. There are also the fruits of the seeds of vocation planted in the Chinese soil. Do not doubt that our faith will prosper in China as everywhere else the Good News is heroically proclaimed by the John Cratz’s of the world.

It is that heroism of faith to which we are all called. To discern God’s will for us is maybe our greatest sacrifice. To follow God’s will is perhaps our greatest opportunity for happiness. Be like John Cratz, S.J., man up, do what is good and right, no matter the consequences, no matter from where the abuses and tortures come.

John Cratz, S.J., was arrested in Tonkin in 1736. In 1737, along with Bl. Bartholomew Alvarez and others, John Cratz, S.J. was put to death after horrible abuses and tortures – unimaginable to you and me; way beyond the ridicule, scorn, familial ostracization you might experience were you to live your faith and do God’s will for you.

I love you,
Dad
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