MARTYROLOGY 2003

Vatican City (Fides Service) - According to information collected by Fides, during 2003 no less than 29 members of the Church including an Archbishop, priests, religious and lay people, lost their lives while proclaiming the Gospel. As for previous years we count not only missionaries ad gentes in the strict sense of the term, but all members of church personnel who chose to risk their lives rather than give up their mission and apostolate: they are “martyrs of charity” as Pope John Paul II fondly calls them. Some were found hours or days after their death, some massacred with other people accidentally at the site or who had sought refuge in parishes or who were co-workers in pastoral activity; many were victims – it would appear – of theft and robberies in particularly violent social contexts or situations of dire poverty.
During the Angelus prayer on 26 December, feast of Saint Stephen, the first martyr, Pope John Paul II asked Catholics to pray for communities and individual believers who suffer for the faith with these words: “In the joyful season of Christmas, today we celebrate Saint Stephen, one of the Church’s first deacons. He is also called "Proto-martyr", because he was the first of the disciples to shed his blood for Christ... The Church calls the day of martyrdom dies natalis. The death of a martyr is in fact a birth to Heaven, through the death and resurrection of Christ. Hence the significance of celebrating the first Martyr on the first day after Christmas: Jesus, born in Bethlehem, offered his life that we too, born "from on high" through faith and Baptism, might be willing to give our life for love of our brothers and sisters. Today I wish especially to remember those Christian communities which suffer persecution and all believers who suffer for the faith. May the Lord give them the strength to persevere and the ability to love those who cause their suffering.”
Not by chance following Christmas the Liturgy recalls the “Sancti comes Christi”, those who shed their blood for Christ: Santo Stefano first martyrs (26 December), the Holy Innocents (28 December). To underline the inseparable bond between God made Man who offers his life for humanity that we in turn may offer our life for others, it is enough to mention German Father Anton Prost, shot dead in Cameroon immediately after Midnight Mass last week, or Italian Annalena Tonelli murdered in Somalia on the very day that great missionaries Comboni, Janssen and Freinademetz were canonised. That same day in El Salvador, parish priest Father William De Jesus Ortez and his young sacristan Jaime Noel Quintanilla were brutally murdered.
With regard to the parts of the world where most of these martyrs died, Africa is top of the list, Uganda in particular where the rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army LRA continue to let blood in their fight against the government, and Democratic Republic of Congo where different groups fight for control of rich natural resources. In this context we have the murder yesterday of Archbishop Michael Courtney, Nuncio in Burundi another country struggling for national reconciliation where a struggle in which the Nuncio was deeply engaged at the side of the local Bishops. Mgr Courtney is the first Nuncio representative of the Holy See to be assassinated.
Following Africa, we have America, Colombia, where five priests and a lay woman were murdered in 2003. In a statement issued on 7 November following the murder of Rev. Saulo Carreño Hernández and Rev. Henry Humberto López Cruz, the Colombian Bishops recall “these victims of the violence and intolerance which afflicts the people of Colombia... These two priests join the long list of men and women cowardly assassinated... The Church, which has paid dearly with numerous priests murdered in the past three years, will continue to call for reconciliation and forgiveness as conditions to establish an authentic and lasting peace ”


REV. DIEUDONNÉ MVUEZOLO-TOVO from the Democratic Republic Congo, co-ordinator for Catholic Schools in Bas Province D.R Congo, shot dead on 11 March 2003 by a man in military uniform on the Tshimpi Matadi road.

REV. NELSON GÓMEZ BEJARANO from Colombia, aged 52 parish priest of the Shrine of the Miraculous Medal Parish in Armenia (Colombia). Killed on 22 March 2003 by robbers.

REV. MARTIN MACHARIA NJOROGE from Kenya, aged 34, died on 11 April 2003 in hospital in Nairobi (Kenya) from injuries inflicted by robbers in the city outskirts. The robbers forced him to get out of his car then fired several shots at him escaping with his car which they abandoned a short distance away. Ordained a priest 4 years ago, he was in charge of St Francis Xavier Parish at Parklands. A brother of Father Martin, also a priest, was killed in 2000.

REV. RAPHAEL NGONA from Democratic Republic of Congo, shot dead on 6 May 2003 on the premises of Bunia diocesan offices where he was temporarily having been appointed parish priest at Drodro.

THREE SEMINARIANS MINOR kidnapped in Lachor (Archdiocese of Gulu, Uganda) during the night of 10 May. All together 41 boys were abducted by LRA rebels: three were confirmed dead, others escaped and the rest are believed to be still in the hands of the rebels.

REV. AIMÉ NJABU AND REV. FRANCOIS XAVIER MATESO from D. R. Congo, found dead on 10 May 2003 in Nyakasanza parish, on the outskirts of Bunia. Rev. Njabu was slain with a machete and Rev. Mateso was shot dead in the parish compound. On the same occasion a number of parishioners were also found dead.

REV. JAIRO GARAVITO from Colombia, aged 36, killed on 15 May 2003 by a group of delinquents who broke into the parish house at Yerbabuena di Chia (Cundinamarca region, Colombia) to steal. He died of suffocation after being beaten, gagged and bound by his killers.

FATHER MANUS CAMPBELL OFM from Ireland killed 21 May 2003 by robbers who broke into the parish in the outskirts of Durban (South Africa). He had been a missionary in South Africa for 45 years.

ANA ISABEL SÁNCHEZ TORRALBA aged 22 from Spain on her first mission abroad as a member of the Calasanziano Voluntary Missionary group, killed in Mongomo, Equatorial Guinea on 1 July 2003 during a police raid.

REV. GEORGE IBRAHIM from Pakistan, aged 38, shot dead at dawn 5 July 2003 by armed men who broke into in his parish dedicated to Our Lady of Fatima at Renala Khurd, Okara district (Pakistan).

FATHER TADDEO GABRIELI OFM Capuchin, aged 73 from Italy stabbed to death on 19 July 2003 at Imperatriz (Maranhao state, Brazil) by a person he was trying to assist, apparently under the influence of alcohol or drugs. He devoted his entire life to evangelisation.

FATHER MARIO MANTOVANI Comboni Missionary, aged 84, from Italy, who had assisted lepers in Uganda for 45 years and Comboni BROTHER GODFREY KIRYOWA from Uganda, aged 29: both men were shot dead on 14 August 2003 on the road between Capeto and Kotido (Uganda) by cattle thieves.

REV. ALPHONSE KAVENDIAMBUKU of the Democratic Republic del Congo (Matadi diocese), killed on 26 August at Kavuaya, Bas Congo province, by five former military who attacked the car in which the priest and another two passengers, one injured the other unhurt, were travelling.

REV. LAWRENCE OYURU parish priest at Ocero, Soroti diocese in Uganda, killed with 25 other people in an ambush staged by LRA rebels on the Soroti - Manasale road on 1 September 2003.

REV. WILLIAM DE JESUS ORTEZ aged 32, born in Jucuapa (El Salvador) parish priest at the cathedral in Santiago de Maria diocese (El Salvador), shot dead inside the cathedral in the afternoon of 5 October 2003. The sacristan JAIME NOEL QUINTANILLA aged 23, was also shot dead.

ANNALENA TONELLI aged 63, from Italy, a voluntary medical worker, shot dead on 5 October as she left the hospital she herself had opened and where she had cared for the local people for 33 years at Borama (northern Somalia).

FATHER SANJEEVANANDA SWAMI from India, aged 52, died of wounds inflicted by aggressors in Belur Kolar district, Bangalore diocese, (India) on 7 October 2003.

REV. SAULO CARREÑO aged 38, from Colombia, parish priest at Saravena, Arauca, (Colombia) shot dead in his car on 3 November. A hospital worker travelling with him Maritza Linares was also killed probably by outlaws fighting for control of this oil-rich area, near Sarare hospital on the Saravena - Fortul road.

REV. HENRY HUMBERTO LÓPEZ CRUZ from Tolima (Lebanon), aged 44, parish priest at Villavicencio, main town of the central Colombian region of Meta, stabbed to death in the parish house during the night of 3 November. His body, tied to a chair, was found the next day by a cleaning woman.

REV. JOSÉ RUBÍN RODRÍGUEZ from Colombia, aged 51, parish priest at La Salina, Casanare, (Colombia) kidnapped on 14 November and murdered in a rural area Tame, Arauca, (Colombia). His body was found a week later on 21 November.

REV. JOSÉ MARIA RUIZ FURLAN aged 69, from Guatemala, shot dead on 14 December at his parish in poor district of Guatemala City. He was known to be a passionate human rights activist and for his work to improve the living conditions of the poor.

FATHER ANTON PROBST aged 68, from Germany, a Claretian Missionary, killed on Christmas Eve 2003 at Akono Novitiate, in Cameroon. After midnight Mass as he returned to his room he met with thieves who gagged and bound him and beat him to death. He came to Cameroon 11 years ago, after spending 24 years on mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo.


ARCHBISHOP MICHAEL COURTNEY from Ireland aged 58, Apostolic Nuncio in Burundi, mortally wounded in his car during an ambush on 29 December at Minago, 50 km south of the capital Bujumbura. Other persons travelling with him were also wounded, whereas the Archishop died of his injuries at Bujumbura hospital.