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LEFT: Vincente Pena
(from the province of Spain) Marty Gleeson, OP (provincial)
Angeline Magro, OP (prioress, St. Mary's) Bonifacio Solis,
provincial Holy Rosary Province) and Bruce Trigo, (Provincial
moderator, Lay Dominicans) |
Monument to
Dominican Martyrs Dedicated
PONCHATOULA, LA --On Oct. 11,2008 a monument to Dominican friars
of the Spanish Holy Rosary Province who were martyred in 1936 during
the Spanish Civil War was dedicated in the Dominican Cemetery at
Rosaryville northwest of New Orleans in Louisiana. These six Dominicans
had been beatified by Pope Benedict XVI on Oct. 28, 2007 at St
Peter's Basilica in Rome.
The dedication began with a Mass at St. Joseph's Dominican Church
in Ponchatoula, with Sr. Angeline Magro, O.P., prioress of the
St Mary's Dominican Sisters, giving the welcome. Very Rev. Martin
J. Gleeson, O.P., provincial of St Martin de Porres Province, presided
at the Mass, with Very Rev. Bonifacio Solís O.P., provincial
of Holy Rosary Province from Hong Kong, presenting the sermon.
Following the Mass, the formal blessing of the monument took place
at the Dominican Friars' Cemetery, on the campus of the Dominican
Spirit Life Center, west of Ponchatoula. Giving the blessing were
these Dominicans-Sr. Angeline, Fr. Gleeson, Fr. Soils, Mr. Bruce
Trigo (provincial moderator of the Dominican Laity) and Sr. Alberta
Schindler (Eucharistic Missionary of St Dominic). This cemetery
contains the graves of friars from Holy Rosary (Spanish missionary),
St Albert's (Central) and St. Martin's (Southern) Provinces —and
from St Mary's Dominican Sisters.
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Rosaryville, LA Cemetery where
the momument commemorating six Spanish Domincian Martyrs
is located |
A very special guest for this dedication was Fr. Vicente Peña,
age 96, currently living in San Antonio, Texas, who as a member
of the Province of Spain was a classmate of some of these martyred
and beatified Dominicans.
This monument, prepared by the Covington Monument Co., commemorates
the six Dominican friars who were martyred in Spain between July
and September 1936 and who had connections with Rosaryville (which
was a Spanish Dominican Seminary from 1911 until 1938).
These six martyred Dominican friars were: Buenaventura Garcia
de Paredes (the 78th Master General of the Order who had established
Rosaryville as a Dominican seminary in 1911), Jesus Villaverde
Andres (prior and rector of the Rosaryville theology studium) and
four missionary priests—Antonio Varona Ortega, Pedro Ibáñez
Alonso, José Maria Carrillo and Leoncio Arce Urrutía.
After leaving Rosaryville, these friars became missionaries in
the Far East and later returned to their native Spain. In 1936,
they became victims of the Spanish Civil War which pitted the Leftist
Republicans against Franco's Nationalists.
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Very Rev. Bonifacio Solís
O.P., provincial of Holy Rosary Province from Hong Kong, presenting
the sermon. |
In his sermon at the Oct 11 Eucharist, Fr. Bonifacio stated: "A
number of the martyrs had left their parents, their land, its tranquility
and peace to walk behind
Jesus through the unknown deserts. As their brethren of another
era and of a contest so different from theirs, what do they want
to tell us? What message must we read in these testimonies? We
envy them, and why not? The grace of martyrdom! They had professed
truth and justice, even after having crossed the seas and spent
many years of their lives in the service of the Kingdom in far
away places; they had the joy of offering their lives for their
own countrymen as an evening sacrifice, in silence and solitude,
sometimes without even any witness other than the many brothers
and sisters who had also offered lives like blossoms that wither,
without bidding farewell to those whom they have the right to embrace
and to console."
On this first anniversary of their beatification, these martyred
friars, along with so many hundreds of other martyred lay women
and men, religious, priests and bishops in Spain, offer our Dominican
family throughout the world the powerful witness of fortitude and
sanctity in serving Jesus Christ.
Carl B. Trutter, OP
St. Martin Province
photo credits: Carl B. Trutter, OP |