Historical Consultors Affirm Fr. Swierc and Companions as Martyrs

Historical Consultors of Saints Dicastery Affirm the Positio super martyrio of Servants of God Jan Swierc and 8 Companions

(ANS – Vatican City – March 29, 2023) – On Tuesday, March 28, the Historical Consultors of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints cast affirmative votes on the Positio super martyrio of the Servants of God Jan Swierc and 8 Companions, Salesian priests, who were killed out of hatred for the Catholic faith in the Nazi death camps in 1941-1942.

The Positio was delivered on July 21, 2022, and had Fr. Szczepan Tadeusz Praskiewicz OCD as its relator, Fr. Pierluigi Cameroni as postulator, and Dr. Mariafrancesca Oggianu as collaborator. The vote of the aforementioned Historical Consultants concerns the scientific value and sufficiency of the documents, collected during the diocesan inquiry, as well as the ascertainment that the reputation of martyrdom is sufficient and constant. Based on this preliminary but essential judgment, the theological consultors and subsequently the cardinal and bishop members of the dicastery will be able to make their judgment on the martyrdom of the Servants of God.

The 9 Polish Salesian priests alleged to have been martyrs of Nazism Frs. Jan Swierc,  Ignacy Antonowicz, Karol Golda, Wlodzimierz Szembek, Franciszek Harazim, Ludwik Mroczek, Ignacy Dobiasz, Kazimierz Wojciechowski, and Franciszek Miska. As priests, these Servants of God were engaged in Poland in various pastoral and governmental activities and in teaching. They were completely uninvolved with respect to the political tensions that agitated Poland during the wartime occupation. Nevertheless, they were arrested and martyred for the very fact of being Catholic priests.

The fortitude and serene perseverance preserved by the Servants of God in the performance of their priestly ministry even during their imprisonment represented a real act of defiance for the Nazis: although exhausted by humiliation and torture, in defiance of prohibitions, the Servants of God were guardians to the end of the souls entrusted to them and showed themselves ready, despite human weakness, to accept death with God and for God.

The Auschwitz concentration camp, known to all as the death camp, and the Dachau concentration camp for Fr. Miska, thus became the site of these Salesian priests’ priestly commitment: to the denial of human dignity and life, Fr. Swierc and 8 companions responded by offering, through the sacraments, the power of grace and the hope of eternity. They welcomed, sustained through the Eucharist and confession, and prepared a great many fellow prisoners for a peaceful death. Such service, not infrequently, was rendered in hiding, taking advantage of the darkness of night and under the constant and pressing threat of severe punishment or, more often, death.

The Servants of God, as true disciples of Jesus, never uttered words of outrage or hatred toward their persecutors. Arrested, beaten, and humiliated in their human and priestly dignity, they offered their suffering to God and remained faithful to the end, certain that he who places everything in the Divine Will, will not be disappointed. Their inner serenity and demeanor manifested even at the hour of death were so extraordinary as to leave their torturers themselves amazed and, in some cases, outraged.