A story for every day...
An act of consecration to Mary written in the blood of a martyr.
In March 1851, a French priest, Father Matha, a missionary in China, had just administered the sacraments to a dying woman, when he fell into the hands of a troop of idolaters, who seized him, dragged him into a pagoda, undressed him and, after having tied him to one of the posts of the building, had a torturer inflict on him up to a hundred strokes of the stick. Covered with wounds, after this horrible torture, the missionary had only a breath of life left, when some Christians obtained, at the price of money, to untie him and to take him away. When their care had revived him a little, the martyr, feeling his wounds still wet, dipped his pen in them and drew, with his blood, a last act of consecration to the Blessed Virgin. Some time later, he died and left to Monsignor Guillemin, Vicar Apostolic of Canton, the precious paper, token of his heroic love for Mary.
