On Sunday, three Italians priests murdered by the Nazis during World War II were beatified, as they edge towards canonization and official recognition as saints.

Fathers Ubaldo Marchioni, Elia Comini and Martino Capelli were beatified at the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna, with the Mass presided over by Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints.

The three men were killed during the Monte Sole massacre, perpetrated by the Nazis which left 770 dead between Sept. 29 and Oct. 5, 1944, as the Germans tried to kill local partisans.

The beatified, who now have the title of “blessed,” had the chance to save themselves, but decided to stay behind to serve the faithful.

“The secret of the martyrs is not heroism, but love that is given completely,” Semeraro said. “The death of the martyrs may seem like a plant without fruit or flower; however, that very emptiness became the place where God made charity flourish.”

“Just as Christ held nothing back for himself, so too did Father Ubaldo, Father Elia, and Father Martino hold nothing back, not even their own lives,” he added.

Even though the three men had the opportunity to save themselves, they stayed and “freely renounced their own safety to fully share in the fate of the brothers entrusted to them. Brothers and sisters, here the beauty of their holiness is revealed.”

“It was precisely this disposition that prepared them to accept martyrdom when hatred against the faith assailed them. Distinct but intimately united, oblatio vitae (the offering of life) and martyrdom illuminate each other in the evangelical logic of the Good Shepherd, who lays down his life for his sheep,” Semeraro explained.

The blood of Jesus, according to Semeraro, is “the fragrance of a Church that does not flee, that does not abandon, that stands in solidarity with those who suffer.”

A big turnout

There were over 150 concelebrants at the Mass, including Cardinal Ángel Fernández Artime, Pro-Prefect of the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life and Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, Archbishop of Bologna.

“Our new blesseds did not remain neutral; they stayed with their brothers and sisters. ‘We must touch the flesh of those who suffer, look into their faces, listen to their stories, and acknowledge their wounds,’ Pope Leo XIV tells us,” Zuppi said.

“Our three blesseds taught us how to do this: They stayed and fulfilled the Father’s will,” he added.

Marchioni was born in 1918 and after ordination became parish priest of San Martino di Caprara in May 1944. He was murdered on Sept. 29 while trying to help faithful who had taken refuge from a Nazi raid in the church of Casaglia.

Comini was born in 1910, and Capelli in 1912, and the two were shot together Oct. 1, 1944, as they tried to help people in Creda.

Decades later, Marcioni’s father, Augusto Marchioni, forgave the man responsible for his son’s death, a SS major named Walter Reder.

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