On the island of Woodlark in Oceania, blessed John Baptist Mazzucconi, priest of the Milan Institute for Foreign Missions and martyr, who, after two years spent in the work of evangelization and already worn out by fevers and ulcers, was slain by the blow of an axe in hatred of the faith.
Lifespan: 1826–1855
Beatified: 19 February 1984 by Pope John Paul II
Memoria liturgica: 7 September
“When the Lord wills it, we shall speak to them of him”
Giovanni Battista Albino Mazzucconi was born in Rancio di Lecco in 1826. He entered the seminary early, and in 1845, together with a group of companions, made a retreat at the Carthusian monastery of Pavia. There he met the prior, Father Suprier, a Carthusian who had previously been a missionary in India. The prior recounted for the young men the people he had encountered, the good he had done and received. His words lodged deep in John Baptist’s heart. Circumstances seemed to favour his aspirations when in 1850 Pius IX asked the Lombard bishops to establish in Milan a seminary for the preparation of young men for the foreign missions.
Hardly ordained a priest, John Baptist transferred with his former companions to the institution that would later be called the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME), and soon departed with them for Australia. After a voyage of three months they reached their destination, and the missionaries divided into two groups: the first settled on the island of Rook, the other continued to Woodlark. The landscape that welcomed them was enchanting, but the indigenous people were wary.
Father Mazzucconi wrote: “For now, the mission must be carried out by remaining always among the local people and learning their language; and then, when the Lord wills it, we shall speak to them of him.” The greatest danger came at first from the climate. Father Mazzucconi fell gravely ill and had to return to Sydney for treatment. Once recovered, he returned to Woodlark, but the reception was anything but friendly. A local chieftain pretended to go out and greet him, then struck him down. John Baptist thus died a martyr of the Christian mission for which he had so ardently longed.