BRESSANI, FRANCESCO GIUSEPPE. – Missionary in Canada and confessor of the faith. Born in Rome on 16 May 1612, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1626. Having completed his studies in Rome and Paris, he taught in the latter city for some time; in 1642 he embarked for New France. After an initial introduction to missionary work in Québec and Trois-Rivières, he was assigned (1644) to the Huron mission, but on the journey he fell into the hands of the Iroquois and was tortured by them with great cruelty. Saved by his incredible physical endurance, he escaped captivity with the help of the Dutch and landed at La Rochelle on 15 November 1644, arousing general admiration, which extended even to the court of Paris. B. obtained from Innocent X, as shortly before St. Isaac Jogues had obtained from Urban VIII, permission to celebrate Mass despite having mutilated hands, and returned to Canada. He worked among the Hurons from the autumn of 1645 until the summer of 1649, that is, until the end of the Huron mission. He then returned to Europe (after nine years spent in Canada), first to France (in 1651 he was at the college of Moulins), then to Italy, where he preached with tremendous success, in Rome (1662–66), Florence, and Naples. He died in Florence on 9 September 1672.
In 1653 he had published at Macerata, dedicating it to Cardinal de Lugo, a Breve relazione d'alcune missioni de' pp. della Compagnia di Gesù nella Nuova Francia (French translation with an introduction by Fr. M. Martin, Montréal and Paris 1852; reprinted with an English translation in R. G. Thwaites’s Jesuit Relations, vols. XXXVIII–XL, Cleveland 1899).