Catholic saint biography
St. Charles Hyon Song-mun
- Lived:
- d. 1846 — Korea
A Catholic liturgical calendar date has not yet been verified for this entry. Execution dates are not treated as feast days; a shared celebration requires a scoped calendar citation.
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Biography
Charles Hyon Song-mun helped Bishop Imbert enter Korea and assisted Jacques Chastan's travel between mission communities. His family suffered repeated losses through persecution. After the missionaries' deaths, he encouraged Catholics, organized help for poor people, maintained contact with missionaries abroad and collected accounts of the martyrs.
Charles later accompanied Andrew Kim Tae-gon on a voyage to Shanghai and helped protect Church property. Arrested in 1846, he encouraged fellow prisoners until his execution at Saenamteo in September. The bishops' biography notes disagreement about the torture he endured, while identifying government records supporting his execution. Those uncertain details are not presented here as established facts.
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What will you carry with you?
After reading about St. Charles Hyon Song-mun, take a moment to consider:
- Which event or decision in this life stood out to you?
- What virtue would you like to understand or practice more deeply?
- What small action could you take today in response?
These are reflection prompts from Saint Discovery, not quotations from the saint.
Sources and further reading
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Individual Catholic institutional source review; original concise factual summary. Compared individual CBCK identity 72, personal name, family relationships and death sequence against all 487 published records and archived legacy identities. Distinct new individual; source names retained for search.
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