JEURIS, PAULINE, ST.

In religion Sr. Marie Amandine, called by the Chinese, 'the laughing foreigner'; martyr, religious of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary; b. Dec. 28, 1872, Herkla-Ville, Belgium; d. July 9, 1900, Taiyüan, China. Without a doubt Pauline's family was pious—four of the seven siblings entered religious life. Following her mother's death (ca. 1879), the children were separated into several homes when her father was forced to seek work in a neighboring village. At age 15, Pauline became a secular Franciscan tertiary. Later she followed her sister Rosalie (Sr. Marie Honorine) into the novitiate at Antwerp and was herself imitated by their sister Mathilde. Now known as Sr. Marie Amandine, she was trained in Marseilles, France, as a nurse in preparation for service in the hospital Bp. Francisco Fagolla wished to establish in Shanxi. En route to her assignment, she met with Sr. Marie Honorine who was stationed in Colombo, Sri Lanka (then Ceylon). She undertook her work with joy until she fell seriously ill. Soon after her recovery the mission was besieged by the Boxers. Having died singing the Te Deum, she was beatified as a martyr with her religious sisters by Pope Pius XII, Nov. 24, 1946, and canonized, Oct. 1, 2000, by Pope John Paul II with Augustine Zhao Rong and companions.

Feast: July 4.

Bibliography: g. goyau, Valiant Women: Mother Mary of the Passion and the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary, tr. g. telford (London 1936). m. t. de blarer, Les Bse Marie Hermine de Jésus et ses compagnes, franciscaines missionnaires de Marie, massacrées le 9 juillet 1900 à Tai–Yuan–Fou, Chine (Paris 1947). l. m. balconi, Le Martiri di Taiyuen (Milan 1945). Acta Apostolicae Sedis 47 (1955) 381–388. L'Osservatore Romano, Eng. Ed. 40 (2000): 1–2, 10. 5503.

[k. i. rabenstein]