Sister Faustina's Confessor To Be Beatified

22-08-2008

ROME, AUG. 20, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Sister
Faustina's confessor and St. Thérèse's parents are among the six who
will be beatified in the next two months.

The group also includes an Italian founder and two Italian priests, one of whom was martyred in Yugoslavia.

Polish
Father Michal Sopocko, Sister Faustina Kowalska's confessor and
spiritual director, and principal promoter of the revelations the nun
received on Divine Mercy, will be beatified Sept. 28 in Poland. Father
Sopocko (1888-1975) also founded the Congregation of Sisters of
Merciful Jesus.

Another
witness of Divine Mercy, Vincenza Maria Poloni (born Lugia)
(1802-1855), founder of the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy, will be
beatified Sept. 21.

Father
Francesco Bonifacio (1912-1946), martyr and victim of ethnic cleansing
in Communist Yugoslavia, will be beatified Oct. 4 in Italy.

Diocesan
priest Father Francesco Pianzola (1881-1943), founder of the
Congregation of Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Queen of Peace,
will also be beatified that same day.

Finally,
as previously announced, Louis and Marie-Zélie Martin, parents of St.
Thérèse of Lisieux, will be beatified on Mission Sunday at the
Cathedral of Lisieux. Mission Sunday is celebrated this year on Oct.
19. St. Thérèse, together with St. Francis Xavier, is the patron of
missions.

The Martins are the
second married couple to be beatified by the Church. Italian spouses
Luigi and Maria Beltrame Quattrocchi were beatified by Pope John Paul
II on Oct. 21, 2001.

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