Charles Garnier (missionary)
Encyclopedia
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
on May 25, 1606, was a Jesuit missionary
Missionary
A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
, who was martyr
Martyr
A martyr is somebody who suffers persecution and death for refusing to renounce, or accept, a belief or cause, usually religious.-Meaning:...
ed at Sainte-Marie among the Hurons
Sainte-Marie among the Hurons
Sainte-Marie among the Hurons was a French Jesuit settlement in Wendake, the land of the Wendat, near modern Midland, Ontario, from 1639 to 1649. It was the first European settlement in what is now the province of Ontario. Eight missionaries from Sainte-Marie were martyred, and were canonized by...
on December 7, 1649.
The son of a secretary to King Henri III of France, Garnier joined the Jesuit seminary in Clermont
Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand is a city and commune of France, in the Auvergne region, with a population of 140,700 . Its metropolitan area had 409,558 inhabitants at the 1999 census. It is the prefecture of the Puy-de-Dôme department...
in 1624 and was ordained in 1635. His father initially forbade him from travelling to Canada where he would face almost certain death as a missionary, but he was eventually allowed to go and arrived in the colony of New France
New France
New France was the area colonized by France in North America during a period beginning with the exploration of the Saint Lawrence River by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Spain and Great Britain in 1763...
in 1636. He travelled immediately to the Huron mission with fellow Jesuit, Pierre Chastellain
Pierre Chastellain
Pierre Chastellain was a Jesuit missionary among the HuronChastellain joined the Jesuits in 1624 and in 1636 sailed for New France with two other priests, Fathers Isaac Jogues and Charles Garnier...
.
He spent the rest of his life as a missionary among the Hurons, never returning to Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
. The Hurons nicknamed him "Ouracha", or "rain-giver", after his arrival was followed by a drought-ending rainfall. He was greatly influenced by fellow missionary Jean de Brébeuf
Jean de Brébeuf
Jean de Brébeuf was a Jesuit missionary, martyred in Canada on March 16, 1649.-Early years:Brébeuf was born in Condé-sur-Vire, Normandy, France. He was the uncle of the fur trader Georges de Brébeuf. He studied near home at Caen. He became a Jesuit in 1617, joining the Order...
, and was known as the "lamb" to Brebeuf's "lion". When Brébeuf was killed in March of 1649, Garnier knew he too might soon die. On December 7, 1649 he was indeed killed by the Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...
during an attack on the Huron village where he was living.
Charles Garnier was canonized in 1930 by Pope Pius XI
Pope Pius XI
Pope Pius XI , born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, was Pope from 6 February 1922, and sovereign of Vatican City from its creation as an independent state on 11 February 1929 until his death on 10 February 1939...
with the other Canadian Martyrs
Canadian Martyrs
The North American Martyrs, also known as the Canadian Martyrs or the Martyrs of New France, were eight Jesuit missionaries from Sainte-Marie among the Hurons, who were martyred in the mid-17th century in Canada, in what are now southern Ontario and upstate New York, during the warfare between the...
, and his feast day is October 19.
Adapted from the article Saint Charles Garnier, from Wikinfo,, licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License
GNU Free Documentation License
The GNU Free Documentation License is a copyleft license for free documentation, designed by the Free Software Foundation for the GNU Project. It is similar to the GNU General Public License, giving readers the rights to copy, redistribute, and modify a work and requires all copies and...
.