GREEN BAY, Wis. (CNS) — Before
donning the habit of a Christian Brother in 1962, Br. James Miller wore the bib
overalls of a Wisconsin farm boy.
While in his green work clothes,
repairing a wall outside of the Casa Indigena De La Salle — his religious community’s
school for indigenous boys in Huehuetenango, Guatemala — Br. James, 37, was
gunned down by three men Feb. 13, 1982.
Soon-to-be Blessed James ‘Santiago’ Miller, FSC
Sept. 21, 1944: Born in Stevens Point, Wisconsin
August 1969: Professed Solemn Vows
Feb. 13, 1982: Martyred in Huehuetenango, Guatemala
Dec. 15, 2009: Named “Servant of God”
Nov. 7, 2018: Pope Francis declares Br. James a martyr
Dec. 7, 2019: Beatified scheduled in Huehuetenango, Guatemala
Nearly 38 years after his death,
Br. James will be beatified during Mass Dec. 7 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of
the Immaculate Conception in Huehuetenango. He will be the first American-born
Christian Brother — or any consecrated brother — declared blessed.
To his friends and family, Br.
James was a farm boy through and through. He was also a deeply spiritual man
who grew to love the poor, indigenous people of Guatemala, who, like him, were
close to the land.
“Jim was a man of faith. He lived
and gave his life helping poor Indian boys learn the trade of farming so they
could feed themselves,” said fellow Christian Brother Stephen Markham, who grew
up on a farm in Iowa and entered the Christian Brothers the same time as Br.
James.
Born Sept. 21, 1944, in Stevens
Point, Wisconsin, Br. James was the oldest of Arnold and Lorraine Miller’s five
children. His siblings include brothers Bill and Ralph, and sisters Pat Richter
and Louise Shafranski. Their father operated a dairy farm that, at its peak,
had 68 cows, said Ralph Miller, who today operates the family homestead in
Ellis with his brother, Bill.
“He always wanted to be a priest at
the start,” Ralph Miller said in a telephone interview. When Br. James was
young, he used to play the role of priest and celebrate Mass.
“Jim made a tabernacle from an old
clock and a monstrance from a tinker toy set,” said Br. Stephen. “When he was
around 10 or 12 years old, he was halfway home from Confession when he
exclaimed, ‘Oh, I forgot to say my penance.’ So he knelt right down there on
the road and prayed.”
The siblings recall their eldest
brother as full of faith.
One of his duties on the farm was
to tend to the chickens, said Br. Stephen. “One day his brother Bill saw him
kneeling over a hurt chicken and praying for it that it would not die.”
Working with his hands and fixing
things around the farm helped Br. James later on as a missionary, said Shafranski,
his sister.
“Jim’s background was a perfect
fit,” she said in an email. “Not only did he have a true calling to the
Christian Brothers, but the fact that he started from a humble farm background
… gave him the knowledge to know how to fix things. It also kept him grounded
to the basics of land, faith and family.”
Christian Brother James Miller is pictured with a child in an undated photo in front of the Colegio De La Salle in Huehuetenango, Guatemala. BrotherMiller was killed by unknown assassins Feb. 13, 1982. (CNS, courtesy of the Christian Brothers of the Midwest)
He attended grade school in his
hometown of Ellis, then entered Pacelli Catholic High School in Stevens Point
in 1958. It was at Pacelli where Br. James was introduced to the Christian
Brothers, who staffed the Catholic high school.
After one year at Pacelli, he
joined the junior novitiate. In September 1959 he was sent to Glencoe,
Missouri.
“In one day, I left the state of
Wisconsin for the first time, took my first train ride and saw a building over
four stories high,” Br. James wrote in a two-page autobiography for his
religious community in June 1978.
He finished his novitiate in
Winona, Minnesota, in 1963, earned a bachelor’s degree at St. Mary’s College,
Winona, in 1966, and was sent to teach Spanish at then-Cretin High School in
St. Paul, Minnesota.
Br. James’s first exposure to
Central America was in July 1969, when he spent the summer in Bluefields,
Nicaragua, studying Spanish. He returned to St. Paul, but made his way back to
Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua, in March 1974. During his five years in Nicaragua,
Br. James helped build an industrial arts and vocational education complex;
served as principal of a government-owned high school, Instituto Nacional
Bartolomé Colón; and even volunteered as a local fire department chief.
“Since I have quite a bit of
experience in building construction, the Nicaraguan government recently asked
me to supervise the construction of 10 new rural grade schools being built in
the region,” he wrote in his autobiography. “I find a lot of satisfaction
working among the very poor here in Nicaragua.”
His association with the Nicaraguan
government of Anastasio Somoza led to Br. James’s departure after the
Sandinista revolution in 1979. He returned to St. Paul and taught one more year
at Cretin High School before being assigned to Huehuetenango, Guatemala.
Br. Paul Joslin was president of
the Christian Brothers community in Huehuetenango when Br. James arrived in
January 1981.
“Br. James and I were the director
and co-director of Casa Indígena,” which housed about 150 indigenous youth from
the Guatemalan highlands who were training to be teachers, said Br. Paul.
Br. James, whose name in Spanish
was “Hermano Santiago,” quickly found ways to put his fix-it skills to work,
repairing plumbing and electrical problems at Casa Indígena.
In a telephone interview, Br. Paul
recalled the tense buildup of fear following reports of pending violence, and
the disbelief when he received word of Br. James’s murder.
The “preferential option for the poor,” a pastoral challenge presented by the Latin American bishops in 1968, influenced the Christian Brothers to provide education to the indigenous children in Guatemala and also led to military retaliation, he said.
Just days before Br. James’s
assassination, the religious community was warned by a border patrol agent,
whose office was located at a nearby army base, that members of a death squad
were looking for one of the seven Christian Brothers in Huehuetenango.
“We were forewarned, but despite
that, the decision that we made individually and collectively, was to remain in
Huehuetenango for as long as possible,” said Br. Paul.
On the morning of his death, Br.
James informed Br. Paul that he would accompany students on a picnic to
celebrate Valentine’s Day. After returning, Br. James decided to fix a hole on
a wall near the Casa Indígena entrance, just one block from the cathedral on a
crowded shopping street.
“He had to get up on a ladder in
order to do it,” said Br. Paul. While on the ladder, three men walking past the
entrance, pulled out guns and shot him numerous times. Sr. Madeleva Manzanares
Suazo, a nurse serving at a nearby hospice, heard the gunshots and ran to find
Br. James on the ground. He apparently died instantly.
“When this happened, I was in the
brothers’ house next to the school, which was one kilometer away from Casa Indígena,”
said Br. Paul. “When I got there, I can’t tell you how awful it was, the shock,
but when I went to reach, to touch Santiago, there was a policeman standing
there and he snapped at me and said, ‘Don’t touch him.’
“I did pick up the hat he was
wearing … and it was still full of sweat, as if he were still alive,” added Br.
Paul.
Christian Brother Paul Joslin holds an image of Br. James Miller, who was killed while serving in Huehuetenango, Guatemala, Feb. 13, 1982. Br. James will be beatified Dec. 7. Also pictured is Br. Michael Reis. The brothers were participating in a pilgrimage May 29 by the Lasallian Volunteers from Stevens Point, Wis., to Ellis, Wis., where Br. James is buried. (CNS photo courtesy of Lasallian Volunteers)
The local bishop celebrated Mass
the following day; more than 1,000 students, parents and friends of the
Christian Brothers then processed to the local airfield.
Br. James’s body was flown to
Guatemala City, where two more Masses were celebrated. Br. Paul accompanied the
coffin from Guatemala to St. Paul, where Archbishop John Roach celebrated Mass
Feb. 16 at the Cathedral of St. Paul.
The body of Br. James was returned
to Wisconsin for another Mass, then burial at St. Martin Cemetery in Ellis, one
mile south of the farm where he was raised.
In a memorial written shortly after
Br. James’s death, Br. Stephen said his friend “followed no other star but his
own.”
“He was proud of his farm
background and never hesitated to share his farm stories, no matter who the
audience,” he said. “He loved his roots, he loved his family dearly.”
In December 1981, during a visit to
Minnesota, when Br. James had knee surgery, Br. Stephen “asked Jim if he wasn’t
frightened by the thought of returning.”
“Jim responded, ‘You don’t think
about that, that’s not why you’re there. There’s too much to be done. … If it
happens, it happens,” Br. Stephen wrote.
Br. James Miller, a native of Ellis, Wis. near Stevens Point, was on the faculty of a Christian Brothers school in Huehuetenango, Guatemala, when he was gunned down Feb. 13, 1982. He is buried at St. Martin Cemetery in Ellis, Wis., one mile from his family’s dairy farm. (CNS, courtesy of Father Tom Lindner)
Br. James was one of more than
200,000 people killed during Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, which ended in
1996. He was the second Catholic missionary from the United States murdered in
Guatemala.
Blessed Stanley Rother, pastor of
St. James the Apostle Parish in Santiago Atitlán, Guatemala, was shot to death
in his rectory July 28, 1981. Pope Francis officially recognized Fr. Rother, a
priest of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, as a martyr for the faith, and on
Sept. 23, 2017, Fr. Rother was beatified in Oklahoma City.
On Feb. 13, 2007, the 25th
anniversary of Br. James’s death, Casa Indígena, the center he called home, was
renamed Centro Indígena Santiago Miller.
In an email, Shafranski recalled
her brother telling her that he would return to Guatemala even though he faced
danger.
“I could be kidnapped, tortured and
killed, or I could simply be gunned down,” she said he told her. “I knew Jim
was very dedicated and committed to his students in Huehuetenango. There was no
stopping him from going back.”
Louise and Rich Shafranski will
travel to Guatemala for the beatification Dec. 7. She is the only sibling who
is able to attend.
“The one thing I hope people
(remember) is that Jim was a real person. He was a son, brother, Christian
Brother and friend,” she said. “He had a hardy laugh, a ready smile, a quick
wit, a good sense of humor and was a genuine hard-working person. He was a man
who felt happiness and sorrow, had great love for both family and the Church.
He loved working with his hands and was through and through a little farm boy
at heart.”
— By Sam Lucero, Catholic News Service. Lucero is news and information manager for THE COMPASS, newspaper of the Diocese of Green Bay.