Hello and welcome to American Catholic History.

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I'm Noel Huster Crowe.

And I'm Tom Crow.

Today we're talking about the North American martyrs, specifically the three who were martyred

in what is today New York State, Saints Renee Guppiel, Isaac Jokes, and John de Lalonde.

Right. The larger group known as the North American Martyrs also includes five others who were

martyred in present-day Canada. And while the group of eight

were canonized together in 1930 and are celebrated together on October 19th, we can't cover

all eight in one episode. So we are going to focus on the three who were killed within present-day

United States. Two other notes before we talk about our heroes.

First, this group of eight martyrs is called the North American martyrs here in the

United States, but in Canada they're called the Canadian martyrs.

That may be because all eight were based in Canada, so they feel special ownership of all

eight.

I don't know.

Should ask my Canadian friends.

But for our Canadian listeners, when we talk about the North America martyrs, we're talking

about the Canadian martyrs to you. Yes. The other point is that contrary to common knowledge,

they were not the first men to shed their blood for Christ in North America.

As we discuss in another episode, a Franciscan priest named Juan de Pidae was martyred

100 years earlier than these Jesuits, and his martyrdom happened somewhere in modern-day

...