Twenty-two martyrs of the Spanish Civil War and a priest beheaded
during the French Revolution will be declared “blessed” by the Church in
coming months.
On April 2, the Pope met with Cardinal Angelo Amato, the prefect of
the Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints, to review
canonization causes up for advancement.
The Vatican announced April 2 that Pope Benedict XVI had approved 29
beatification decrees and recognized the "heroic virtue" of six
candidates for sainthood.
The causes of Father Francisco Esteban Lacal of the Missionary
Oblates of Mary Immaculate and 21 of his companions – among them Oblate
students, religious and priests – were approved for martyrdom.
They were
killed in 1936 along with a layman, Candido Castan San Jose, after a
series of persecutions against them for their work in religious
communities and parishes.
It is estimated that nearly 7,000 clergy and religious, including 12
bishops, were killed for their faith during the 1936-1939 Spanish Civil
War.
The Vatican also determined that Father Peter Adrian Toulorge of the
Premonstratensian Regular Canons died as a martyr during the French
Revolution. He was guillotined in Coutances, France in 1793 for being a
Catholic priest.
His cause was opened in 1922, along with those of 56 other priests from France's Normandy region.
In addition to the newly declared martyrs, the Vatican approved
miracles attributed to the intercession of two priests and three
religious sisters from Italy and Spain, thus paving the way for their
beatifications.
Among them is Father Clemente Vismara, an Italian priest of the
Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions who died in 1988 at 91 years
old. The miracle involved a 10-year old boy in Myanmar, where Fr.
Vismara worked.
The boy hit his head on a rock after he fell from a tree branch
15-feet above the ground. He went into a coma, but after three days of
prayer for Fr. Vismara's intercession, the boy woke up and suffered no
permanent damage.
Although no canonization causes were approved to fully recognize
sainthood, six Catholic faithful were recognized for having shown
"heroic virtue" in their lives.
Bishop Thomas Kurialacherry, the first
bishop of Changanacherry, India, Canadian religious Br. Theophanius-Leo
Chatillon of the Brothers of Christian Schools and 14-year old Bernhard
Lehner, a courageously faithful German teenager who died from an illness
in 1944 were among them.