I walked from Lucky Chinatown Mall in along Reina Regente Street in Binondo to the Minor Basilica and National Shrine of Saint Lorenzo Ruiz, or Binondo Church near Ongpin Street and Quentin Paredes Street.

This church is dedicated to San Lorenzo Ruiz, the first Filipino saint.  Born in the late 1500s, he was the child of a Chinese father and a Filipino mother.  Both were Catholics.  From an early age, he was already active in Binondo Church.  He also received education from the priests of the church which gave him the skills to work as a clerk in the church later on in life.

In 1636, he joined Spanish missionary priests to Okinawa in Japan to spread the Catholic faith.  Unfortunately, this was also the time that the Tokugawa Shogunate was persecuting Christians and were determined to wipe out Christianity from Japan.  The Shogunate feared that Japan might become like the Philippines which was successfully colonized by the Spanish by way of converting the people to Christianity.

Lorenzo Ruiz and his companions were arrested and imprisoned.  In 1637, they were brought to Nagasaki to undergo trial by torture.  He and his companions were subjected to very cruel torture but he did not renounce his faith.  He died in September 1637 at the age of 42.

Saint Lorenzo Ruiz was canonized in 1987 by Pope John Paul II.


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