“It’s not just that it was a good, noble and even holy family, but that the entire family suffered martyrdom” – Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Dicastery for Saints, said during a press conference in Łańcut, on the eve of the beatification of the Ulma Family.
Cardinal Semeraro pointed out that in the concept of martyrdom in the Catholic Church, we talk about someone dying at the hands of a persecutor who is motivated by hatred towards the faith, i.e. odium fidei, professed by the victim.
“The persecutors’ hatred was caused by the fact that this family took in two Jewish families under its roof”- Cardinal Semeraro emphasized. He added that from the entire history of the Ulma family, this “yes” in the parable of the Good Samaritan means that they defended the root from which the Savior Jesus Christ comes. “The Ulma family took under their roof and kept the root of our faith” – he noted.
The Prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints noted that the second special element of beatification is the fact that the entire family is beatified on the path of martyrdom. “In this beatification we see the fruit of God’s grace in the sacrament of baptism and in the sacrament of marriage” – he pointed out.
The Prefect of the Dicastery explained that the beatification process originally included parents and six children. “It was known that Wiktoria, mother, was in an advanced stage of pregnancy, expecting a child. After careful analysis, it turned out that when Wiktoria was barbarously murdered, the seventh child she was carrying under her heart saw the light. We don’t talk about it as doctors, but we talk about it in a human way” – he said.
Cardinal Semeraro noted that as assessed by the Dicastery, “we say here that this child received the baptism of blood. It was immersed in the blood of its mother, who suffered a martyr’s death”.
Archbishop Adam Szal, Metropolitan of Przemyśl, admitted that the beatification of the Ulma family is an extraordinary event. He recalled that John Paul II obliged the Episcopates at the turn of the century to look for witnesses of faith and martyrs. He added that the beatification was a challenge for the archdiocese to bring these figures closer and examine whether this family really deserves to be included in the catalog of martyrs of the Catholic Church. “This is the work of many people who interviewed living witnesses of these events. I would like to thank the many people who took such a keen interest in this matter and publicized it. We have been praying for many years for beatification. This is a great grace from God” – he emphasized.
Archbishop Szal assessed that we face the challenge of caring for the family. “This is the time to step up to keep our families strong. Therefore, we are grateful to the Dicastery that the liturgical commemoration of the Ulma Family will fall on the day of the Ulma marriage, that is, July 7″.
Fr. Witold Burda, postulator of the beatification process of the Ulma Family, explained that the aim of the process is to learn the truth about the life and death of candidates for the altars.
AW
Source: BP KEP