A catechist of the young Korean Church, put to death at Seoul in 1866 and canonized among the 103 Martyrs of Korea in 1984.

Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng was a catechist of Korea’s persecuted Catholic community, martyred at Seoul, South Korea in 1866 during the Byeong-in persecution of 1866–71. Korean Catholicism had grown up largely without resident priests after 1784 and repeatedly faced state execution for the crime of baptism. Petrus was beatified in 1968 and canonized by Pope John Paul II on 6 May 1984 in Seoul, together with 102 companions now honored as the 103 Martyrs of Korea.

Quick Facts

• Born: c. 1815 (Korea)
• Died: 1866-03-09 (Seoul, South Korea)
• Feast Day: September 20 (with the Martyrs of Korea)
• Venerated as: One of the 103 Martyrs of Korea, catechist

Who Was Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng?

Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng was a Catholic of Korea, catechist, put to death at Seoul, South Korea during the Byeong-in persecution of 1866–71, the largest and bloodiest of the Joseon anti-Catholic campaigns, launched by the regent Heungseon Daewongun. Korea’s Catholic community had grown up almost entirely without resident clergy after 1784, when Korean scholars first brought the faith home from Beijing and began baptizing one another; the Joseon state treated conversion as a capital offense against the Confucian social order, and Petrus was one of many ordinary believers who paid for that conviction with their life.

Historical Setting

The record places Petrus squarely within the Byeong-in persecution of 1866–71, the largest and bloodiest of the Joseon anti-Catholic campaigns, launched by the regent Heungseon Daewongun. Nineteenth-century Korea’s rulers viewed the growing Catholic community as a threat to the kingdom’s Confucian order and, after the 1801, 1839, 1846, and 1866 waves of arrests, thousands of believers were imprisoned, tortured to extract recantation, and executed by strangulation or beheading when they refused. Seoul was one of the sites where this machinery of interrogation and execution operated, and it is there that the source register locates Petrus’s death in 1866.

Why the Church Remembers Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng

The Church remembers Petrus as one of the ordinary faithful of the young Korean Church: a layperson who held to baptism rather than the formal renunciation that would have spared their life. As a catechist, Petrus had likely already borne responsibility for teaching and steadying others in the faith before arrest made that witness final. Together with the other 102 Martyrs of Korea, Petrus’s death is honored as part of the seed from which the modern Korean Catholic Church grew.

Canonization and Feast Day

Petrus was beatified in 1968 and, along with the rest of the group known collectively as the 103 Martyrs of Korea, was canonized by Pope John Paul II on 6 May 1984 during his visit to Seoul — the first canonization Mass a pope had ever celebrated outside Rome. The date and ceremony are well documented; nothing beyond the register’s death notice survives to describe Petrus’s life before arrest.

What Catholics Can Learn Today

Petrus’s witness is a plain one: ordinary faith, held under pressure that could have been escaped with a single word of denial. For Catholics today it is a reminder that fidelity is not reserved for the extraordinary — it was lived out by married laypeople, catechists, and even children in a persecuted Korean Church with almost no priests of its own for much of its early history.

A Prayer to Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng

Saint Petrus Ch’oe Hyŏng, you held fast to the faith you received even to the point of death. Obtain for us the courage to remain faithful when fidelity costs something, and pray for the Church in Korea that first bore witness in you. Amen.

Sources

• Roman Martyrology
• Butler’s Lives of the Saints
• Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea, materials on the 103 Martyrs of Korea