The beatification ceremony of Ján Havlík will be held on Saturday 31 August 2024 in the National Shrine, Basilica of the Virgin Mary of Seven Sorrows in Šaštín. Here is the official programme of the celebration. In anticipation of this great event of grace Fr. Marlio Nasayó Liévano, cm introduces us to the life of our Servant of God

On the altars of the Congregation of the Mission, we venerate missionaries with pastoral staffs, sanctified priests in the corridors and classrooms of the seminaries and on the missionary trails, and humble brothers sanctified like Marta in the hidden missionary life. Among them, 64 sons of the Lord of Paul shine with a halo of their own. But there was an empty niche, that of the seminarians, which today, on the eve of the 400th anniversary of the “Little Company”, is filled by Jan Havrik.

He led a holy life, excellent in song, gifted in speech, devoted to the Miraculous Mother, persevering and loving prayer, always faithful to his Christian and Vincentian vocation in the midst of the cross and persecution.

On 9 June 2013, the diocesan investigation into his martyrdom began, the Congress of Theologians, meeting on 30 March 2023, approved his martyrdom, and on 14 December of the same year, Pope Francis authorised the promulgation of the decree of martyrdom, with the solemn beatification scheduled for 31 August 2024 in Šaštin (Slovakia). The representative of the Supreme Pontiff will be Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints.

God’s seed germinated in the family forge

I am inspired to begin our reflection by the words of Our Lord in the Gospel according to Matthew 3:9, when He says that “God can make Abraham’s children out of stones”, and without forcing the text to say that if this were so, how much more so would He take them out of fertile and well-cultivated land. Our brother Jan did not come from a stony and barren field, but rather from a fertile and well-cultivated land, as was the home of Karol and Justina, and he was the first and most extraordinary fruit, who showed the path of God to his three brothers who came after him.

The Lord called him to life on 12 February 1928, in the town of Vlčkovany (then Czechoslovakia), today Dubovce (Slovakia). His parents had basic salaries, his father was a state employee and his mother a nurse, who also worked in agriculture in order to earn a better income. They worked hard, and prayer at home was assiduous, daily and fervent, with the study of the catechism, the recitation of the rosary, and the participation of the whole family in the Sunday Eucharist.

It was in an atmosphere of love, prayer and sacrifice that our future missionary was forged. He attended secondary school in the even more distant town of Skalica, 18 kilometres away, a distance that the young Havlík travelled on foot or by bicycle. It is clear that his youthful vigour will serve him well in his desire to further his education. In fact, Ján’s studies continued at a high level, because they were carried out with seriousness and dedication.

Vincentian life… the field where the seed planted grew, matured and bore fruit

St. Vincent de Paul in the conference of July 1642 (SV IX-1 88-90), speaking of the first Daughter of Charity, said: “Marguerite Naseau, of Suresnes, is the first sister who had the good fortune to show the way to the others…” (SV IX-1 88-90). In our case, the figure of Sister Modesta Havlíková, Jan’s aunt, emerges. In a parody, we can say that she, the beloved aunt, the Daughter of Charity, who one day met the Lord in the Vincentian gap, and living happily and fulfilled in it, by all means managed to make her nephew drink from the crystal clear water she enjoyed, showing him the way of St. Vincent.

Thus, in 1943, we find our future saint in the Apostolic School, and at the end of the preliminary stage, in 1949, in the Internal Seminary, thus becoming a member of the Congregation of the Mission for life. He is the young man who, having heard the voice of the Lord, evangeliser of the poor, follows him in his youthful joys, but solidly prepared to carry the cross of fidelity and dedication throughout his short missionary life, an unsuspected and undreamt-of cross, but which he carried without faltering when it came to him.

Many of us missionaries have had the good fortune to have had Daughters of Charity, Vincentian Missionaries or committed lay people, who have been for us a light on the path of our uncertain search for the Lord, who, by their example, their words and their company, have led us and sustained us in the perseverance of the Vincentian missionary vocation. Mavric, how insistently he insists that we should strive for vocational work and, if necessary, look for “our replacement” so that tomorrow we can hand over to him the torch of the vocation that we have carried so well. How can we not pray for our vocations, how can we not support those who knock at our doors, or whom we meet in the sun and rain of missionary work, how can we not encourage those who feel faint-hearted and want to look back… to be, in a word, guardians of our vocations?

Prison… the mission field among the poor

Fr. Vinícius Augusto Teixeira, c.m., in his substantial article “Ján Havlík: the power of desire”, tells us:

“All Havlík’s efforts were invigorated and animated by his desire to become what the Lord was calling him to be. On one occasion, his sister Maria mentioned what her mother had told her about the missionary ardour that had been a part of her first-born son’s youth: “I know from my mother that in his novitiate days Ján wanted to become a missionary and go to Russia to teach Christianity to the children of Stalin”. A schoolmate also refers to the apostolic aspirations of the young Havlík: “His classmates at that time already knew that he wanted to become a priest and go abroad as a missionary. These youthful ideals are not the fruit of an adventurous heart, but the result of a soul matured in God and for God, as he expresses in his writings: “There is no greater gift than to give oneself unconditionally to God”.

But our seminarian soon realised that being a missionary was no longer possible in the high mountain ranges of Russia or in its icy mountains, but in the uranium mines and in the dark communist prisons. And why? Quite simply, the communist regime had been established in his homeland, and Jan, in his fidelity to God and the Church, did not want to give up his vocation. In the dungeons and dungeons was his missionary field. There he had been planted by the Lord, and there was the space for it to blossom and bear abundant fruit. He rightly tells us:

“Isn’t it the task of the Missionaries to help those who have been thrown into the rubble of society? If we get 10 to 15 years in prison, we can’t talk about the provisional and think: I’ll study later, I’ll work for the Kingdom of God later. They need it now, even if they are weak. All the prisoners, the desperate, the ignorant, the apathetic, the murderers and the criminals need it. Manifest now what is inside you, if you are serious about the mission you have dreamed of since you were young. I feel the same as in the missions. I could not imagine a better and more challenging field of work. We must let everyone know that our love is Christ. To all the thousands of prisoners in Jáchymov, Příbram, Slavkov…. It is a programme for our whole life. To put love in the affairs of state, in families, communities, schools, offices… to bring love in all our actions.

And this was the missionary pulpit of this young man, with his boundless fidelity to God, to the Church, to the Congregation of the Mission, to the poor: his resilient witness, the joy of his dedication, the sacrificial work, the recitation of the rosary and the catechesis with his cellmates, was the missionary field where Jan realised his vocation and mission. It was exactly 11 years of isolation and humiliation (1951 – 29 October 1962). When he was released, he continued his mission in the warmth of his family, doing good within and outside his own family, until the Lord, from his cradle, led him to sing Christmas carols together with him eternally, “in the mission of heaven” on 27 December 1965.

And the oak tree planted next to God’s ditch…did not fall…it died standing upright

And let us look at the glorious end of our Blessed Havrik, quoting Fr Teixeira:

“After a more intense malaise on the evening of the 26th, it seemed that his health problems had given him a respite, and he told his father that he would like to find a job so that he could help support the family. On 27 December 1965, Ján took a bus to the nearby village of Popudiny to see his doctor. From there he went to Skalica, taking a radio with him to have it fixed. Then he would go to the hospital for tests and, if necessary, admission. If it was still possible, he would visit his brother Anton, who lived in town, to spend New Year’s Eve with him. However, that would be the last day of his earthly life. As soon as he arrived in the city, while walking down the street, just as he was in front of a doctor’s house, he felt ill and leaned against a rubbish bin. Noticing the young man’s condition, the doctor came to help him, but to no avail. Ján Havlík’s weak heart had already stopped beating. The doctor took him home with the help of a passer-by to give him last aid. He did not know Ján, but his wife did. As a nurse, she had received him at the hospital during one of his many admissions, and she remembered his serenity and kindness.

In the silence, prayer and meditation in his cell, this lecture of the Founder, which he had read in the Internal Seminary, surely came to his mind more than once. Could our martyr have imagined that this text would be fulfilled in him to the letter?

“Let us give ourselves to God, fathers, to go into all the earth to carry His holy gospel; and wherever He places us, let us know how to keep our station and our practices until His divine will is to remove us thence. Let not difficulties drag us down; it is for the glory of the eternal Father and the efficacy of His Son’s word and passion. The salvation of peoples and our own salvation are so great a benefit that they are worth every effort, at whatever cost; it does not matter if we die first, provided we die with arms in our hands; we shall then be happier, and the company will not be the poorer for it, since ‘sanguis martyrum semen est christianorum’. For one missionary who has given his life in charity, the goodness of God will raise up many others who will do the good that the first has failed to do” (S.V., XI/3, 290).

And with the Chinese proverb let us conclude: “It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness”

• Jan’s prayer, next to the Lord in the heavenly mansion, has been heard: he could not physically go to “teach Christianity to the children of Stalin” … his confreres could, when with courageous courage motivated by Fr Maloney they went to different regions, reaching Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, where he penetrated with his prayer and his suffering, continuing there with evangelical tenacity and heroism. But others, not a few heroic Vincentians, have gone to other parts of the world to bring the Gospel of Jesus to the poor. Their beatification should be for young and not so young, an encouragement to continue in the battle without hesitation and with fortitude, until the last breath of life is breathed out.
• If Jan is a model Vincentian, he is especially so for the young people of our colleges, schools and seminaries. There is now no excuse for them to follow the Lord, there is a current, young, contemporary reference point, and a fierce herald of the Gospel, seeking to cultivate an upright conscience, enlightened by faith, capable of educating their desires and directing them in the direction of what is true, good and beautiful, according to the will of God.
• In the face of the culture of the fleeting, the liquid and ephemeral, we are called to persevere in the good, in the most sincere searches and in fidelity to the missionary and Vincentian vocation, even in the midst of adversity and trials.
• The new Blessed Jan Havrik places us at the gates of our Fourth Centenary, as sentinels of the treasure of the Society that we have received, and to be more daring in the spiritual life, more creative in fulfilling our mission, more generous in mission, opening new ways that bring us and our brothers before the Lord.

What a joy to know that, as missionaries, we are little lights before the Tabernacle and before our brothers and sisters, that we spend with joy, to the last drop of the oil of the lamps of our lives before Him and the poor!

 Marlio Nasayó Liévano, cm