(ANS - Vatican City - February 27) - On February 27, in an audience granted to Cardinal
Angelo Amato, SDB, prefect of the Congregation for Saints’ Causes, Pope Francis
authorized that Congregation to promulgate decrees confirming the martyrdom of
the Servant of God Fr. Titus Zeman, SDB (1915-1969), and the heroic
virtues of the Servant of God Ottavio Ortiz Arrieta, SDB, bishop of Chachapoyas,
Peru (1878-1958).
Fr. Titus Zeman
The inquiry for the
beatification and canonization of Titus Zeman started only in 2007. The
diocesan inquiry was held in the archdiocese of Bratislava from February 26, 2010,
to December 7, 2012. The validity of the diocesan inquiry was recognized by the
Congregation for Saints’ Causes on June 28, 2013. When the positio was prepared, the discussion
took place, according to the usual procedure, whether the death of the Servant
of God was a true martyrdom. The result was positive, and a special meeting
CSC’s theological consultors took place on April 7, 2016. At the ordinary session
of February 21, 2017, the cardinal and bishop members of CSC recognized that
the Servant of God was killed for his faithfulness to Christ.
Fr. Zeman was born in Vajnory, Slovakia, on January
4, 1915, the son of peasant farmers who were also the sacristans of their
parish church. He suffered various illnesses from early childhood. After a
sudden recovery at the age of 10, he promised Mary to “be her son forever” and
to become a Salesian priest.
He became a novice in 1931, made his perpetual
profession in 1938, and was ordained in 1940. He remained steadfast against the
Communist regime. In 1946 he was dismissed from the school where he taught
because he defended the crucifix. He managed to escape the “Night of the
Barbarians” and the deportation of religious (April 13-14, 1950). He then
looked for ways to help Salesian seminarians reach the priesthood. He organized
expeditions to pass them through the Iron Curtain to Turin, but on his third venture
(April 1951) he was caught.
Fr. Zeman had to face about 13 years of wrongful
imprisonment and torture, experiencing hardship in prison and labor camps. He
was forced to endure long periods of isolation and to work with radioactive
uranium without any protection. He was branded as a “man marked for elimination.”
In 1964 he was given five years on parole but was constantly spied on and
persecuted. He was forbidden to exercise the priestly ministry publicly. He
died in his home town on January 8, 1969, after a triple heart attack, a martyr
for vocations.
Already at the time of his death he was regarded as
a martyr. In 1991, following the fall the Communist government, a review of his
case declared him innocent.
The witness of Fr. Zeman is the embodiment of the
vocational call of Jesus and of a pastoral predilection for the young,
especially for young Salesians, which became for him a true passion. He once
said, “Even if I lost my life, I would not consider it wasted, knowing that at
least one of those I had helped had become a priest in my place.”
Bishop Ottavio Ortiz Arrieta
In the cause of Ottavio
Ortiz Arrieta, the diocesan inquiry took place in the Chachapoyas diocese from July
8, 1992, to December 22, 2001. It was recognized as valid by the CSC on October
3, 2003. When the positio was
prepared, the discussion took place according to the usual
procedure, whether the Servant of God had exercised the virtues to a
heroic degree. The result was positive, and on February 19, 2015, a special meeting
of the theological consultors was held. The cardinals and bishops in the ordinary
session of February 7, 2017, recognized that the Servant of God practised the
theological, cardinal, and other related virtues to a heroic degree.
Bishop
Ortiz, the first Peruvian Salesian, was born in Lima, Peru, on April 19, 1878,
and died in Chachapoyas, Peru, on March 1, 1958. He was bishop of Chachapoyas
for 37 years.
In December 1893 Octavio entered the Salesian school
for the poorest as a carpentry pupil, and was later admitted to the academic
school. He did his novitiate in Callao, and in 1902 he pronounced his perpetual
vows before Fr. Paul Albera, who was carrying out an extensive extraordinary
visit of all the houses of the Americas on behalf of the Rector Major, Fr.
Michael Rua. In 1906 Bro. Octavio was sent to found a new vocational school in
Piura. He was ordained on January 27, 1907, and later he was director in the
houses of Cuzco and Callao.
On November
21, 1921, Fr. Ortiz was appointed bishop of the far away diocese of Chachapoyas
(in the northern parts of the Andes). The see, comprising a territory
of 37,000 square miles, a little larger than Indiana, with a population of 250,000, had been vacant for five years. He was ordained a bishop in
the shrine of Mary Help of Christians in Lima on June 11, 1922, but he reached
his episcopal see only after a month’s journey. His life was spent in
continuous travelling: by horseback and on foot, in the mountains and the
jungle and along the rivers. He was amiable, welcoming, cheerful, and close to
the people.
A born organizer, Bishop Ortiz planned missions and
spiritual retreats for lay people and priests in all the centers of his
diocese. Catechesis, preaching, care for priests and seminarians, and the
promotion of vocations were the constant concerns of his 37 years as a bishop. He
taught catechism whenever he could, and young people filled the rooms of his
old episcopal house. He did eight pastoral visitations, celebrated three diocesan
synods and a Eucharistic Congress. He put parish archives in order, created
associations and confraternities, and published a newspaper.
When the archdiocese of Lima became vacant, the apostolic
nuncio, on behalf of the Pope, offered it to him. Bishop Ortiz thanked him but
declined the proposal; he wanted to stay among the people of his pueblos unto death, which claimed him
at the age of 75.
[Ed. note: The decree that
Fr. Zeman was martyred for the Faith means that he can be beatified as soon as
a date can be set and the rite of beatification arranged.
The decree that Bishop Ortiz is Venerable means that if a miracle will
be attributed to his heavenly intercession, and confirmed as such by the CSC,
he can be beatified.]
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