VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis applauded the beatification of four Argentine martyrs – a bishop, two priests and a layman – who were murdered early in the country’s seven-year long “Dirty War.”
After praying the “Regina Coeli” prayer with pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square April 28, the pope said the lives of Blesseds Enrique Angelelli Carletti, Carlos de Dios Murias, Gabriel Longueville and Wenceslao Pedernera are models for those “who work for a society that is more just and based on solidarity. ... These martyrs of the faith were persecuted for the cause of justice and evangelical charity,” the pope said. “Let’s applaud the newly beatified!”
The four martyrs were beatified during an outdoor Mass in La Rioja, Argentina, April 27 celebrated by Cardinal Angelo Becciu, prefect of the Congregation for Saints’ Causes.
In his homily, Cardinal Becciu said the four men were “faithful witnesses of the Gospel” who stood firm “in their love for Christ and his church at the cost of suffering and the extreme sacrifice of life.”
Upon seizing power in Argentina in 1976, the military dictatorship began a swift campaign of brutal repression that included executing political dissidents or those perceived to be left-wing sympathizers; in all, an estimated 30,000 people were killed or disappeared. Among the first casualties in the military’s campaign were Blessed Murias, a Franciscan priest, and Blessed Longueville, a French missionary. Both men served in the Diocese of La Rioja.
According to the Argentine website “Nunca Mas” (“Never Again”), a site cataloging the casualties of the “Dirty War,” several men who identified themselves as federal policemen arrested the two priests on July 18, 1976, subsequently torturing and murdering them.
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