Today, April 2, is the commemoration of Saint Pedro Calungsod.
Pedro was born in 1654 and was educated by the Jesuits in the Visayas. He could read, write and speak Visayan, Spanish, and Chamorro. He had an artistic streak: he could paint, draw, sing, and do carpentry.
He was a teenage catechist who worked with Spanish Jesuit missionaries to the violent Chamarros in the Ladrones Islands (modern Marianas) in 1668. Because he was a Christian on a mission to baptize and catechize the Chamorros, Pedro was murdered by two natives.
He died trying to defend the priest he was serving, Blessed Diego Luis de San Vitores. He was speared to death in 1672. Pedro and Fr. Diego’s bodies were stripped, with their feet tied to stones, and thrown into the deep waters.
Pope St. John Paul II beatified Pedro in Rome in 2000. Pope Benedict XVI canonized him in 2012, also in Rome.