Myanmar priest and Philippine layman among 17 missionaries ‘martyred’ in 2025
The report by Agenzia Fides includes the death of two Catholics engaged in pastoral work killed in Asia: Father Donald Martin Ye Naing Win, of the Archdiocese of Mandalay, and layman Mark Christian Malaca, a teacher in Laur. Last year, no deaths were reported. This year’s figures reflect a growing trend.
Rome (AsiaNews) – In 2024, the annual report of Agenzia Fides, the news agency of the Pontifical Mission Societies, reported no violent deaths among missionaries in Asia, despite incessant threats against pastoral workers in various countries.
This year’s edition, released today, reports the violent death of a priest and a layperson who were involved in apostolic work: Father Donald Martin, 44, from Mandalay, Myanmar, and Mark Christian Malaca, 39, from Laur, Philippines.
For them, as for all 17 victims recorded worldwide, up from 13 in 2024, the news agency prefers the term missionary to that of martyr, noting that it will be up to the Church to recognise their eventual martyrdom.
The study, published per tradition at the end of the year, begins quoting Pope Leo XIV who spoke on 14 September, on the occasion of the Commemoration of the Martyrs and Witnesses to the Faith of the 21st Century.
Celebrated especially in the Jubilee now drawing to a close, the hope these people held was “full of immortality”, as well as “unarmed”. For the pontiff, “no one can silence their voice or erase the love they have shown”.
Elsewhere, Africa saw the highest number of missionaries killed: 10 (six priests, two seminarians, two catechists). In the Americas, the figure is four (two priests, two religious sisters), with one in Europe (a priest).
According to the report by the Agenzia Fides, the number of “witnesses and missionaries who voluntarily offered their lives to Christ until the very end” stood at 626 in the first 25 years of this millennium.
These people are not only “missionaries and pastoral workers ‘ad gentes’ in the strict sense”. The term “missionary” is applied “in a broader context, encompassing all Catholics who were involved in some way in pastoral works and ecclesial activities and who died violently”.
Citing Evangelii Gaudium by Pope Francis, the report notes that all the “baptized, whatever their position in the Church or their level of instruction in the faith, are agents of evangelization.” Thus, the term “missionary” refers to “all the baptized”.
AsiaNews had already reported the death of Father Donald Martin Ye Naing Win, a Catholic priest in the Archdiocese of Mandalay, a day after his murder, which occurred on 14 February in a village in the Sagaing region.
His lifeless, mutilated body was found by some parishioners in the parish compound, leading to the arrest of 10 suspects in connection with the heinous act.
“I only kneel before God,” the priest told his murderers, Agenzia Fides quoted him as saying, citing two women who were present at the incident.
He is first clergyman killed in Myanmar’s civil war, and was found on “February 14 at 6 pm, by parishioners in the grounds of the parish of Our Lady of Lourdes, where he was the parish priest,” says the report. His church is located in Kan Gyi Taw, a village in Shwe Bo District, Sagaing Region, where he was “violently and cruelly stabbed several times.”
The killers, part of a group opposing Myanmar’s ruling military junta, were under the influence of drugs and alcohol. The ferocity suggests “a targeted attack for reasons that have yet to be investigated”, a truth that is hard to define in a context of “widespread violence”.
“Father Donald Martin was ordained a priest in 2018. In this period of civil war, he carried out his task as pastor of souls with zeal, fidelity and obedience, administering the sacraments in the parish and trying to be close to the suffering community,” the report reads.
“Furthermore, like so many other priests, he dedicated himself to humanitarian assistance to displaced people scattered throughout the territory, bringing them spiritual consolation and material aid,” it adds.
The second pastoral worker killed in Asia in 2025, Mark Christian Malaca, was a teacher at St. Stephen Academy, a Catholic school in Laur, Diocese of Cabanatuan, Nueva Ecija, a province in central Luzon.
“Mark Christian Malaca, a teacher at St. Stephen Academy, a Catholic school in the city of Laur. Malaca, 39, was shot dead on November 4 by unknown assailants in the village of San Juan, where he lived,” reads the report by Agenzia Fides, which dedicated a brief biographical note to each of the 17 victims killed in 2025.
“According to initial investigations, the killers, wearing black jackets, helmets, and face masks, approached and fired several shots at the victim. Malaca was known for his faith and his commitment to education.”
After his death, the Catholic community of Cabanatuan immediately demanded “justice and truth”. For his part, Bishop Prudencio Andaya urged the authorities “to conduct a swift, impartial, and transparent investigation” since “those responsible must be held accountable”.
Stressing how the teacher’s death is a loss for all of society, the prelate remembered him as “a Catholic teacher” who "participated in the noble mission of forming minds and hearts in truth and virtue."
St. Stephen Academy also remembered their staff member. “His memory will remain a light and inspiration in our continuing struggle for truth and goodness,” the school said in a statement.
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19/02/2025 18:27
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