St Jean de Brébeuf

St Jean de Brébeuf (1593-1649), French Jesuit missionary, who worked primarily among the Huron in Quebec, Canada. He was born near St-Lô, Normandy, and ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1622. In 1625 he arrived in the New World with the French explorer Samuel de Champlain. When the village of his Jesuit mission Sainte Marie Among the Hurons, near Georgian Bay, Lake Huron, was taken by the Iroquois in 1648, during the war in which they virtually destroyed the Huron, Brébeuf and fellow Jesuit missionary Gabriel Lalemant, his associate, were made prisoners and tortured to death. The tortures they endured are considered among the most hideous in the entire history of martyrdom. Their feast day is October 19. Brébeuf, Lalemant, and six other Jesuits, known collectively as the Jesuit North American Martyrs in the United States, and as the Canadian Martyrs in Canada, were canonized in 1930.