A Chinese Catholic layman from Guizhou province martyred in 1856 during a regional persecution of the Church.

Saint Laurentius Bai Xiaoman was a Catholic layman of Guizhou province in China, martyred at Xilin in Guangxi on February 25, 1856, at about thirty-four years old. His death took place during a mid-nineteenth-century wave of anti-Christian violence in southwestern China that also claimed the lives of other Guizhou Catholics later canonized alongside him. He was beatified in 1900 and canonized in 2000 by Pope John Paul II among the martyr saints of China.

Quick Facts

• Born: Guizhou, China, c. 1822
• Died: February 25, 1856, Xilin, Guangxi, China (age about 34)
• Beatified: 1900; Canonized: 2000
• Venerated as: Lay martyr of Guizhou

Who Was Saint Laurentius Bai Xiaoman?

Laurentius Bai Xiaoman was a Catholic layman from Guizhou province in southwestern China, part of a Catholic community that had grown there over the preceding century despite periodic official hostility. He was martyred at Xilin, across the provincial border in Guangxi, in 1856, during a local crackdown on Christian activity in the region.

Historical Setting

Mid-nineteenth-century China saw sporadic, often locally driven persecutions of Christians even before the larger, empire-wide violence of the Boxer Rebellion at the century’s end, and Guizhou’s Catholic communities, established through earlier missionary work, were repeatedly targeted by local officials suspicious of a faith they associated with foreign influence and social disruption.

Why the Church Remembers Saint Laurentius Bai Xiaoman

The Church remembers Laurentius Bai Xiaoman as part of the Guizhou Catholic community’s sustained nineteenth-century witness under local persecution, a witness that produced several martyrs from the same province later canonized together as part of the broader recognition of China’s Catholic martyrs.

Canonization and Feast Day

He was beatified in 1900 and canonized on October 1, 2000, when Pope John Paul II canonized 120 martyrs of China as a group, recognizing the full span of Chinese Catholic martyrdom from the seventeenth through the early twentieth centuries.

What Catholics Can Learn Today

Laurentius Bai Xiaoman’s martyrdom, one of several from the same province and era, is a reminder that entire Catholic communities, not only isolated individuals, sometimes bore the cost of the faith together. It calls modern Catholics to recognize and support the Church wherever it faces similar pressure today.

A Prayer to Saint Laurentius Bai Xiaoman

Saint Laurentius Bai Xiaoman, martyr of Guizhou, you gave your life within a community that suffered together for the faith. Watch over the Catholic Church in China today, and give all who face pressure for their belief the same steadfastness you and your fellow believers showed. Amen.

Sources

• Vatican.va canonization homily for the Martyr Saints of China (2000)
• Roman Martyrology
• Butler’s Lives of the Saints