Pope prays example of beatified Spaniards will spur reconciliation

Published: 2007-10-29

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Just minutes before Pope Benedict XVI prayed that the example of newly beatified Spanish martyrs would spur Catholics to work for reconciliation and peaceful coexistence, a small fight broke out across town in front of a church run by Opus Dei. At his noon Angelus address Oct. 28, the pope said the 498 martyrs beatified in St. Peter's Square that morning were "heroic witnesses of the faith who, moved exclusively by love for Christ, paid with their blood for their fidelity to him and his church." The new martyrs were killed during the 1936-39 Spanish Civil War by supporters of the Spanish revolutionary government. Opposing the government was the fascist National Movement led by Gen. Francisco Franco. Most Spanish church leaders supported Franco during the 1930s because of the anti-clerical policies of the revolutionary government. Pope Benedict, addressing the estimated 30,000 pilgrims gathered at the Vatican for the beatification, said he hoped the martyrs' "words and gestures of forgiveness toward their persecutors" would lead Christians today to "worked tirelessly for mercy, reconciliation and peaceful coexistence." As the Vatican beatification Mass was ending, a group of young Roman leftists, calling themselves the "Militants," marched in front of Rome's Basilica of St. Eugene, a church entrusted to the care of Prelature of Opus Dei, the predominantly lay movement founded in Spain. The protesters carried a banner that read, "One who has killed, tortured and exploited cannot be beatified."

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