Blessed Mario Borzaga, Oblate Missionary and Martyr of Laos

Who was Blessed Mario Borzaga?

Blessed Mario Borzaga was a young Italian priest of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate who gave the last three years of his life to the Hmong mountain people of Laos. In April 1960, with his catechist Paul Thoj Xyooj, he set out on foot to visit villages that wanted to hear about Christ. Neither came back. Communist guerrillas ambushed and killed them, and their bodies were never found.

The Church declared both men martyrs, and they were beatified in Vientiane on December 11, 2016. His home Archdiocese of Trento and his Oblate brothers keep his memorial on September 4.

The life of Mario Borzaga

From Trento to the Oblates

Mario was born in Trento, in northern Italy, on August 27, 1932. He entered the diocesan seminary at eleven. At twenty, in 1952, he left it to join the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, the missionary congregation founded by St. Eugene de Mazenod, because he wanted to go to the missions.

He kept a diary through his years of training, and it shows a young man burning to give himself completely. On February 19, 1957, during the Way of the Cross, he wrote:

I too have been chosen for martyrdom. And if I want to be a holy priest I should not wish for more, because this is the mystery that lies in my hands, every day: the mystery of the blood, of total immolation, of the complete giving of oneself.

On Good Friday that year he added, "The martyrs should be imitated, not praised!" He was ordained a priest on February 24, 1957.

Missionary in Laos

Late in 1957 he sailed from Naples with the first group of Italian Oblates sent to Laos. In 1958 he worked in villages along the Mekong, learning the languages, and then he was assigned to Kiu Kacham, a Hmong mission in the mountains of the Luang Prabang region. There he taught catechism, visited families in their scattered hamlets and cared for the sick.

Laos was sliding into civil war. Communist Pathet Lao forces were active in the hills, and they saw foreign missionaries as enemies. Father Borzaga kept going out to the villages. He titled his diary himself: Diario di un uomo felice, "Diary of a Happy Man."

The martyrdom of Mario Borzaga and Paul Thoj Xyooj

On April 25, 1960, Father Borzaga set out with Paul Thoj Xyooj, a Hmong catechist of nineteen, to visit villages that had asked to learn more about the Gospel. After that, all trace of them was lost. Only decades later did witnesses tell what had happened: the two had been ambushed and killed by Pathet Lao guerrillas. The Dicastery for the Causes of Saints dates Father Borzaga's death to May 1, 1960, and says he had his throat cut. He was twenty-seven.

The young catechist could have saved himself. One account says the guerrillas meant to kill the foreign priest and offered to let Paul go, and that he refused, answering, "If you kill him, kill me too." The Dicastery says simply that he "refused to be separated from his priest" and offered his young life to stay faithful to his Christian ideal.

• Approved: the martyrdom of both men, in odium fidei, recognized by Pope Francis in May 2015. As martyrs they were beatified without a miracle.
• Reported: the catechist's words "If you kill him, kill me too," handed down by later witnesses.

Beatification

On December 11, 2016, in Vientiane, the capital of Laos, Mario Borzaga and Paul Thoj Xyooj were beatified together with Father Joseph Thao Tien, the first Laotian priest, and fourteen companions: seventeen martyrs in all, priests of the Paris Foreign Missions and the Oblates, and lay catechists, killed between 1954 and 1970. It was a great day for the small Catholic community of Laos, about one percent of the population.

In 2022 a new church dedicated to Blessed Paul Thoj Xyooj was opened at Ban Nam Gnam in Vientiane province, the first church dedicated to a Hmong martyr. Oblate houses in Africa, Germany and Texas now bear Father Borzaga's name.

Symbols of Blessed Mario Borzaga in art

There is no old artwork of Father Borzaga; he is known from photographs. Devotional images show him:

• In a black cassock with the Oblate missionary cross, the large crucifix every Oblate receives at his perpetual vows;
• A young face, as in his photographs;
• With his diary, for Diary of a Happy Man;
• Beside Paul Thoj Xyooj, his catechist and fellow martyr, often in Hmong dress;
• With the martyr's palm.

Feast day and prayer

The Archdiocese of Trento and the Oblates of Mary Immaculate keep the memorial of Blessed Mario Borzaga on September 4. In Laos the martyrs are honored together on December 16. See the feast day calendar.

We know of no traditional prayer to him that we can quote. Let us ask Blessed Mario and Blessed Paul to pray for missionaries and catechists, for the Church in Laos and among the Hmong people, and for young people who want to give their whole lives to God. Blessed Mario Borzaga and Paul Thoj Xyooj, pray for us.