If we know Fr Jacques Hamel is a martyr, we should be praying to him. If we don’t, then we should be praying for him. These are the very practical consequences of a theological question which came to the fore last week: what makes a martyr?
To the secular mind, it may seem perverse to respond to a brutal terrorist murder by quibbling about theology. But Catholics have always held martyrs in high esteem. As an act of perfect charity, martyrdom sends the victim straight to heaven.
In the 1st century AD, Ignatius of Antioch wrote to his fellow-Christians and begged them not to save him from his impending martyrdom: “I beseech of you not to show an unseasonable goodwill towards me,” he said. In a reference to the Romans’ preferred method of execution, he added: “Allow me to become food for the wild beasts.”
During the Reformation, when the English College in Rome got news of a fresh martyrdom, the priests and seminarians would sing the Te Deum and attend a sung Solemn Mass.
The martyr gives – as the Catechism says – the “supreme witness to the truth of the faith”. In the aftermath of Fr Hamel’s death, many felt this was what the simple, pious French priest had given.
Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney, a member of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said in a homily that the priest “died in odium fidei, that is in hatred of the faith. This is a term Catholics use to describe the characteristic death of a martyr, as one who dies for his or her faith, and because of that faith.” He compared Fr Hamel to St Stephen.
But the traditional definition of martyrdom is more complex than that. It relies on three things, according to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints: 1) A violent death; 2) being killed out of hatred of the faith; 3) voluntary acceptance of death.
It’s the third one that is the issue with Fr Hamel. Did he voluntarily accept death? According to reports, Fr Hamel resisted his attackers. For him to be declared a martyr (the word is etymologically linked to “witness”) it would have to be shown that he accepted death.
Fr Peter Joseph, a lecturer at Vianney College in Australia, says: “If there was resistance on Fr Hamel’s part (quite justified and legitimate morally), then he would not be given the official title of ‘martyr’.” Fr Joseph points out: “For the same reason, soldiers may be heroic but are never proclaimed martyrs by the Church. The element of voluntary acceptance is a necessary part of martyrdom.”
Some object to this definition. Aren’t the Holy Innocents listed in the martyrology? And since they were babies, they can hardly be said to have accepted death voluntarily. But as so often, the Church’s tradition has an answer to that. According to St Thomas Aquinas, God gave the babies a special grace of martyrdom which they had not earned – just as God gives babies a special unearned grace in baptism. St Augustine said that those who doubted infant baptism would also doubt that the Holy Innocents were given martyrs’ crowns.
So the jury is out on Fr Hamel’s martyrdom. It seems as though he lacked the criterion of “voluntary acceptance”; but until the full picture emerges, and is examined by the theologians, we can’t be sure.
Even then, he might not be canonised, because there are prudential considerations about who is made a saint. Fr Henry Garnet was killed by the English government for refusing to break the seal of the confessional. But when the bishops of England and Wales promoted the causes of the 40 martyrs, they left him off the list.
This was because he had been linked with various plots against the Crown. He hadn’t actually been a plotter, but anything which the media could frame as “plotter declared a saint” was felt imprudent.
Some have said the same might apply to Fr Hamel. Going on about martyrdom, they say, only encourages the narrative of “holy war” on which extremists thrive. Others respond that this places political correctness above our duty to the dead.
The language of martyrdom, the fascination with violent death at the hands of those who hate Catholicism, is inseparable from our faith. But that doesn’t mean we should abandon our prudence or our intellectual caution – which are also part of the Church’s understanding of martyrdom.
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