The 17 Thomasian Martyrs were the 12 Dominican priests, 1 Franciscan priest and 3 Dominican bishops who became administrators, professors, or students in the University of Santo Tomas in Manila,[1] they are venerated in the Catholic Church regarded them as a martyrs and declared as a saints and blesseds by several popes throughout the 20th and 21st century, All of them gave up their lives for their Christian faith, some in Japan, others in Vietnam, and in the 20th century, in Spain during the Spanish Civil War.

Lorenzo Ruiz de Manila was among the lay companions of the Thomasian Martyrs of Japan,[2] their feast day is celebrated every year on November 6.

Factors in the outbreak of severe repression of Christianity in Japan certainly included the fear of the Shoguns of all foreign influence.

His favorite saint was Peter of Verona, the protomartyr of the Dominican order, thus his religious enthusiasm gave rise to his living desire for martyrdom.

After a year of missionary activity, he was arrested, proudly wearing his habit to signify that he went to Japan for the sake of the Gospel.

Born in February, 1589 in Regil, Guipuzcoa, Spain, Domingo Ibáñez de Erquicia entered the Dominican Priory of San Thelmo at the age of 16.

Realizing the need for missionaries in the Far East, he joined the Dominicans who went to the Philippines and arrived in Manila in the year 1611 and became professor of Theology at the University of Santo Tomás.

Constantly faced with danger, he spent his decade of mission in Japan faithfully preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments, until he was finally caught by the Japanese authorities and killed through the "gallows and hole" torture, by which "the persons were hung upside down from gallows with the upper half of the body hanging into a fetid hole.

[7] After his petition to serve his people was approved, he went back to Vietnam as a missionary, working under Jacinto Castañeda, until he was arrested, tortured, and beheaded on November 7, 1773.

Born in the year 1800 to a poor family in Santo Domingo de la Calzada in Spain, Jeronimo Hermosilla entered the Diocesan Seminary of Valencia when he was fifteen years of age, but later sought admission to the Order of Preachers after being captivated by his Dominican professors.

In 1841 he was appointed bishop, and despite the persecution, continued his ministry hiding in safe places, until he was finally captured and beheaded in 1861.

Last October 28, 2007, Pope Benedict XVI beatified 498 martyrs of the Spanish Civil War, in a Holy Mass presided over by Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

The Republican government and its supporters, a combined force of communists, socialists and anarchists, was particularly antagonistic towards the nobility, the land owners, and the Catholic Church.

In 1936, a coup d'etat staged by rebel forces (Nacionalistas) attempted to overthrow the communist republicans, leading to a three-year political unrest characterized by extreme brutality and violence resulting to countless deaths among the government and rebel forces, as well as ordinary citizens caught in the war.

Since the Catholic Church has been among those considered as enemies of the republicans, thousands of priests and religious perished in organized persecutions.

Though the civil war began in 1936, communist forces had started torturing and executing priests and religious as early as 1933.

Born to a pious family in Castañedo de Valdes, Luarca, Spain on April 19, 1866, Paredes eventually decided to enter the Order of Preachers and received the Dominican habit on August 30, 1833.

True to the Dominican tradition of scholarship, he studied theology, civil law, and philosophy and letters prior to his ordination to the priesthood on July 25, 1891.

While in Manila, he obtained the degree of lector in theology, which was a requirement for teaching in the University of Santo Tomas.

He came back to Manila when in 1910, he was elected as the Prior Provincial of the Holy Rosary Province, a position he held for seven years.

During his term as Provincial, he became among those responsible for the procurement of a land in Sulucan Hills on which the present UST Campus now stands.

Being constantly under police surveillance, Paredes had to stay in a boarding house, where he continued to perform his priestly duties: hearing confessions, praying the office, and celebrating the Eucharist.

Jesus Villaverde Andres was born in San Miguel de Dueñas, León, Spain, on December 4, 1877.

Villaverde went back to Spain to serve as prior of the Santo Tomás Convent in Avila and later on was assigned to Madrid.

Often criticized for his being strict and somewhat temperamental, unknown to many, Villaverde was quietly suffering the pains brought on him by his liver disease.

Witnesses of his priestly life affirm that he was an excellent preacher, and his brilliance as a theology earned him the respect of the Holy See.

These four martyrs of the Religious Persecution in Spain sailed to the Philippines as young Dominican missionaries assigned to the Holy Rosary Province.

Born on September 5, 1880, in the old city of Manila, Eugenio Saz-Orozco took the name Jose Maria when he entered the Order of the Friars Minor Capuchin in Spain.

He finished his secondary schooling in 1895 at the University of Santo Tomas while remaining “alumno interno” at San Juan de Letran.

His last words before he died were: “Long live Christ the King!” The University of Santo Tomas holds an annual commemoration in honor of the martyrs.