The foreigner

was an educated young man who spoke gently and showed great care for people. Everyone who knew him said he had a kind heart.

Nonetheless, the government saw him as a threat and the Prime Minister decided to take dramatic action. Early one morning, they swept through the compound where the young man was, catching him and his associates off guard.

The Prime Minister came to the scene and personally split open the skull of the kind young man.

St. Peter Chanel, French-born missionary and parish priest, was thus martyred on this very day 164 years ago in an island kingdom of Oceania. He was canonized in 1954.