They threw him in jail, took away his books, his eyeglasses, even his shoes. But they couldn’t break his spirit. His devotion to his faith and to the people of China helped Fr. Sigfrid Schneider survive 29 months—most of it in solitary confinement—in a Communist prison. His remarkable story was told in dramatic detail by his friar nephews in a Catholic Update Video entitled, Praying the Rosary (St. Anthony Messenger Press). A native of Louisville, Sigfrid was one of 10 men in his family who gave their lives to the Franciscan Order. Four months after his ordination in 1931, he sailed to China, working as a teacher and pastor at the Franciscan Mission in Wuchang, Hupeh. From 1943-’45, he was confined to house arrest in Shanghai by the invading Japanese. Concerned about papal influence in China, the Communists who rose to power in 1949 imprisoned both Sigfrid and his bishop, Rembert Kowalski. Closely guarded, instructed to “meditate on his crimes,” Sigfrid chose to pray, unraveling his socks and tying the threads together to fashion a homemade rosary. His ingenuity was his saving grace. After his release from prison, he was expelled from China on trumped-up spy charges. Sigfrid spent two years in the States, returning to the Far East in1954 to help the friars establish a presence in Japan. There he died in 1987. His homemade rosary, preserved for all these years, is one of the most treasured possessions of the Franciscan Archives in Cincinnati.

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