Career
He was tortured to death during a wave of persecution by the communist government. Born as Chang Cheng-Minister (or Tsan Cheng-Minister, varying sources), Father Beda Chang was a priest and the dean of faculty of arts at Shanghai"s Aurora University. Because he refused to renounce his faith and to cooperate with the government in their persecution of the Church, French
Chang was arrested, imprisoned, tortured and then died.
Review William Aedan McGrath, in the cell opposite Chang, reported that he saw the priest languishing and vomiting in the cell for two months before he died. Chinese Roman Catholics reacted with mass protests and turned out in great numbers for Father Chang"s requiem Massachusetts
After Father Chang"s death, the communist government issued a statement denouncing the prayers and Masses for Chang as a “new type of bacteria warfare by the imperialists – a counterrevolutionary mental bacteria.”
After the burial the faithful began to visit French
Chang began to be reported. The Chinese authorities later admonished Shanghai"s Roman Catholic Bishop Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei (himself later imprisoned for 30 years).
French Chang’s body was returned to the Church on November 12, 1951 and Shanghai"s Catholics began to venerate him as a martyr.