Stanley Francis Rother was an American Roman Catholic priest from Oklahoma who was murdered in Guatemala. Ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City in 1963, he held several parish assignments there until 1968 when he was assigned as a missionary priest to Guatemala, where he was murdered in 1981 inside his mission rectory.
Mariano de la Mata Aparício was a Spanish Roman Catholic priest and a professed member of the Order of Saint Augustine. He joined the missions in Brazil where he served until his death and was known for his educational work with the poor. His age and diminishing health was no obstacle for him throughout his time in Brazil and it did not hinder his efforts to visit the sick or go out to be with the people he looked after.
Francesco Spoto was an Italian Catholic priest who served in the missions in the Democratic Republic of Congo and was killed there. He was also a professed member from the Missionary Servants of the Poor.
The Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War are the Catholic Church's term for the people killed by Republicans during the Spanish Civil War for their faith. More than 6,800 clergy and religious were killed in the Red Terror. As of February 2022, 2,069 Spanish martyrs have been beatified; 11 of them being canonized. For some 2,000 additional martyrs, the beatification process is underway.
Jaime Hilario Barbal – born Manuel Barbal i Cosán – was a Spanish Roman Catholic and a professed religious brother from the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools. He served for almost two decades as a teacher in the schools that his order managed until being caught up in the turmoil of the Spanish Civil War that saw the forces of the Second Spanish Republic execute him.
János Scheffler was a Hungarian-born Roman Catholic prelate who served as the bishop of two dioceses before acting as the Bishop of Oradea Mare. He was imprisoned due to opposing the Communist government policies and was killed while imprisoned. He had been noted during his episcopate for his attentiveness to vocations and to the defense of the faith from those forces that sought to disrupt it such as communism.
Otto Neururer was an Austrian Roman Catholic priest and was the first priest to die in a Nazi concentration camp. Neururer did his studies for the priesthood in Brixen before he served as a teacher and pastor in several cities before settling in 1932 in Götzens near Innsbruck. He was arrested in 1938 for attempting to persuade a girl not to be wed to a man of questionable morals and was sent to Dachau before being transferred to Buchenwald where he died after being hanged upside down.
Miroslav Bulešić was a Roman Catholic Croatian priest. He studied in Rome before being recalled to his native Croatia where he was ordained in 1943 during World War II prior to two parish postings where he became a vocal critic of Communism. He renewed his parishes through well-organized pastoral activities and was a promoter of frequent sacramental reception. But his criticism of Communism saw him make enemies who soon set upon and succeeded in killing him.
Odoardo Focherini was an Italian Roman Catholic journalist. He issued false documents to Jews during World War II in order for them to escape the Nazi regime but was arrested and sent to a concentration camp where he later died. Yad Vashem later recognized him as a Righteous Among the Nations in 1969 for his efforts.
Mateo Elías Nieves Castillo was a Mexican Roman Catholic priest who was also a member of the Order of Saint Augustine who assumed the name of Elias del Socorro when he became a member of the order.
Engelmar Unzeitig, born Hubert Unzeitig, was a German Roman Catholic priest who died in the Dachau Concentration Camp during World War II on the charge of being a priest. He was a professed member of the Mariannhill Missionaries and assumed the name of "Engelmar" when he was admitted into the order. He became known as the "Angel of Dachau".
Carl Lampert was an Austrian Roman Catholic priest who served as the pro-vicar for the Diocese of Feldkirch in addition to being an outspoken critic of Nazism during World War II. This led to constant surveillance against him and his eventual arrests on several occasions. This all culminated with his final arrest in 1943 and his death from the guillotine in 1944 alongside a fellow Christian prisoner.
Darío Acosta Zurita was a Mexican Roman Catholic priest who administered in Veracruz where he lived and was killed. Zurita commenced his studies for the priesthood after he had once been refused entrance and he became known as an athletic seminarian. Bishop Rafael Guízar Valencia ordained him in 1931 and he was killed three months later after armed gunmen stormed the cathedral – enacting the so-called Tejeda Law – and shot him dead.
The Martyrs of Tlaxcala were three Mexican Roman Catholic teenagers from the state of Tlaxcala: Cristobal (1514/15–1527) and the two companions Antonio (1516/17–1529) and Juan (1516/17–1529). The three Teenagers were converts from the indigenous traditions of their families to the Roman Catholic faith and received their educations from the Order of Friars Minor who baptized them and evangelized in the area. Their activism and evangelical zeal led to their deaths at the hands of those who detested their newfound faith and perceived them as dangers to their values and rituals.
The Martyrs of Natal were a group of 30 Roman Catholic people of Colonial Brazil – two of them priests – killed in the northern part of the colony in massacres that a large group of Dutch Calvinists led. One priest was a Colonial Brazilian Jesuit missionary, while the other priest was an evangelizer himself. The others were all lay Catholics, most of them anonymous members of the Church, some of them children.
Francesc de Paula Castelló Aleu was a Spanish Roman Catholic killed during the Spanish Civil War on false accusations of fascism. Castelló was noted for his devout and outgoing nature in addition for his activism in Christian movements such as the Catholic Action; he had friends from these movements and in one met his fiancée though his death broke their soon-to-be union. He worked as a chemist for a time prior to conscription into the armed services on the eve of the civil war.
Luigi Versiglia, S.D.B. was an Italian Roman Catholic prelate and professed member from the Salesians of Don Bosco who served as the first Apostolic Vicar of Shaoguan from 1920 until his murder. He was also a former novice master noted for his strict austerities and discipline but for his loving and compassionate care of the poor and defenceless. He led the first Salesian expedition to China in 1906 and remained there until his death functioning for the people in various capacities such as a gardener and barber.
Juan Bautista and Jacinto de los Ángeles were Mexican Roman Catholics. The pair were both instructed to protect moral practices in their town and to ensure that the faith was safeguarded in the face of pagan and tribal beliefs and practices. But this put them into conflict with some locals who decided to hunt them down and kill them after the pair interrupted a ritual and confiscated their possessions. The two men were slain after being captured in a local Dominican convent and after having professed their faith to their attackers.
Johannes Laurentius Weiss and his two companions Michele Pio Fasoli and Antonio Francesco Marzorati were German and Italian Roman Catholic priests and missionaries as well as professed members from the Order of Friars Minor. The three were all made missionaries in 1704 in Rome before setting off for Cairo to begin their travel through the Nile River to reach Ethiopia. But the team experienced significant pitfalls: conflicts in Ethiopia slowed them down and forced their return to Cairo though the team succeeded in their second attempt to reach their destination. Finally, anti-religious sentiment started fermenting there under the new monarch who decreed missionaries to be nothing more than heretics, which resulted in the three friars being stoned.
Victor Emilio Moscoso y Cárdenas was an Ecuadorian Roman Catholic priest and professed member from the Jesuits. He served as a teacher in the COPEM college in Riobamba since 1892 and it was there that he was slain during the Liberal Revolution which had started in 1895. Moscoso was a noted philosopher and taught rhetoric and grammar to his students while serving as a professor; he also served as the college's rector from 1893 until his assassination.
