Beatified UST martyrs honored in Mass

Last October 28, the biggest beatification ceremony in the Church’s history was celebrated at St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican.

That day, 498 martyrs from the religious persecution during the Spanish Civil War (1933-1937) were beatified in a ceremony presided by Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, the prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of the Saints. Among the new martyrs were eight Dominicans who had worked or studied in the Philippines; six of them had worked in the University of Santo Tomas.

Thomasian martyrs beatified

Six Thomasian martyrs were declared “Blessed” in the biggest beatification in history presided by Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints, at St. Peter’s Square in Rome last October 28.

The 498 beatified martyrs, who died in the hands of an anticlerical movement in Spain in the early 1930s, were composed of two bishops, 24 diocesan priests, 462 religious, one deacon, one sub-deacon (a position which does not exist today), one seminarian, and seven lay people.