Saturday in Jaén Cathedral, 124 martyrs of the Spanish Civil War will be beatified. Bishop Chico calls their blood “fertile seed” for today’s Church.
Newsroom (12/12/2025 ) On Saturday, December 13, the Diocese of Jaén will celebrate the beatification of 109 priests, 14 lay people, and one Poor Clare nun killed during the Spanish Civil War for their Catholic faith. The rite, presided over by Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, will take place in the Cathedral of the Assumption, the same temple where several of the martyrs spent their final days before execution.
With these 124 new blessed, the total number of 20th-century Spanish martyrs recognized by the Catholic Church rises to 2,254, eleven of whom have already been canonized.
In a pastoral letter released for the occasion, Bishop Sebastián Chico Martínez described the martyrs’ sacrifice as “fertile seed” that continues to nourish the diocese’s parishes, communities, families, and brotherhoods. “His blood, far from being sterile, has become a fertile seed that today nourishes the faith of our parishes… and impels us to live Christ more deeply so that we, too, may be witnesses of hope in the midst of the world,” the bishop wrote.
Monsignor Chico framed martyrdom theologically as “the victory of love and the fullness of hope,” noting that Sacred Scripture presents blood shed for God as “a seed of fidelity, of eternal life and of hope.” Each martyr, he added, “has been a grace from God for the Church and a rich legacy of charity and hope that we must know and preserve.”
The prelate stressed that the martyrs “were not heroes, humanly speaking, nor ideological fighters, nor fallen in a war for earthly interests,” but ordinary men and women who, despite human weakness, overcame evil “with the sole strength of an unwavering faith in Christ.” “Their only weapon was love,” he said.
Known historically as the “Holy Kingdom,” Jaén has produced martyrs across the centuries, from Roman-era soldiers Saints Bonosus and Maximian to medieval figures such as Saint Peter Pascual. The new blessed join earlier 20th-century sons and daughters of the diocese already beatified, including Saint Pedro Poveda, founder of the Teresian Association, martyred in Madrid in 1936.
Bishop Chico highlighted three of the 124 as emblematic: Father Francisco de Paula Padilla Gutiérrez, who voluntarily offered his life in place of a father of six children; lay doctor Pedro Sandoica y Granados, executed for publicly confessing the faith; and widow Obdulia Puchol, known for her charity toward the poor and shot for her fidelity to Christ.
The bishop urged the faithful to see the martyrs not merely as figures of the past but as contemporary teachers. They serve, he said, as role models for priests, mirrors for consecrated religious, examples for lay people and families, and—using modern language—“influencers” for young people.
Above all, Monsignor Chico concluded, the 124 new blessed invite today’s Church to radical faith without compromise, to constant forgiveness even amid violence, to the building of reconciliation and peace, and to the conviction that “holiness is possible in all vocations.” For Jaén, the title “Holy Kingdom,” he said, “is not an empty or merely historical title, but a profound spiritual truth” newly confirmed and enriched by Saturday’s beatification.
- Raju Hasmukh with files from ACI Prensa
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