GRASSI, GREGORIO, blessed. – Observant Friar Minor, bishop and martyr in China, born at Castellazzo Bormida (Alessandria) on 13 Dec. 1833, died at Tai-yuangfu (northern Shiansi) on 9 July 1900.
A Franciscan in 1848 and priest in 1856, he left for China in 1861, where for 40 years he exercised his effective zeal, first as a simple missionary and then as titular bishop of Ortosia and coadjutor with right of succession, subsequently apostolic vicar of northern Shian-si. During the persecution of 1900, unleashed by Tse-Hsi, the Emperor’s mother, with the support of the Boxers, he was imprisoned at his residence in Tai-yuangfu on 5 July and killed in hatred of the faith on the 9th of the same month. He was beatified by Pius XII, together with 28 other companions, both Europeans and Chinese, on 27 Nov. 1946. The cause for canonization was resumed on 25 Feb. 1949 (AAS, 41 [1949], pp. 84, 472-73). For the names of the other martyr companions, V. CINA, III, coll. 1666-67.