Anecdotes about the Virgin Mary

The girls of Songkhon who did not renounce

Songkhon (Thailand) (1940)

In the Catholic village of Songkhon, in northeastern Thailand, along the great Mekong River, the memory is preserved of a handful of simple Christians who gave their lives for the faith in December 1940. It was during the Franco-Thai War, and in a climate of anti-French nationalism, Catholics were viewed with suspicion because of their ties to missionaries from France. The pressure on the small community of Songkhon intensified, demanding that they renounce their faith.

The first to shed his blood was Felipe Siphong Onphitak, a father and catechist, the first native Thai to die for his faith, murdered on December 16. A few days later, on December 26, two nuns from the Institute of the Lovers of the Cross, a congregation of Vietnamese origin, were shot in the village cemetery along with several laywomen: Agatha Phutta, fifty-nine years old, and three teenagers, Cecilia Butsi, Bibiana Khampai, and Maria Phon. They refused to renounce their faith and accepted death with serenity.

The accounts, based on testimonies gathered for the cause, emphasize the steadfastness of those young women, who rejected the officer's pressure and prepared to die fully aware that they were giving their lives for Christ. In 1959, the remains of Philip Siphong were reunited with those of the other martyrs, and a shrine was built around them. On October 22, 1989, Saint John Paul II beatified them in Rome. Since then, Songkhon has been a place of pilgrimage for the small Thai Catholic community.

A crucial point should be noted. The documented information includes the names of the martyrs, the dates, the location, the context of the persecution, and their beatification. However, a specific Marian devotion under the title "Our Lady of the Martyrs" or a Marian shrine in Sampran linked to them is not mentioned in the consulted sources; what does exist is the shrine of the martyrs in Songkhon itself. Nor are there any records in these sources of processions or Rosary devotions specifically associated with them.

And yet, there is a moving Marian thread: two of the martyrs were Lovers of the Cross, a congregation founded to live alongside Mary at the foot of Calvary, and one of the teenagers was named Maria. Like a hidden seed, her blood fertilized the young Church in Thailand.