New saints show courage to defend faith, help those in need, pope says

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Holiness flourishes in those who serve the weakest, and Christians should defend the truths of the faith, no matter the cost, Pope Leo XIV said, highlighting key traits of the new saints he proclaimed.

Meeting with visitors from different countries who were in Rome for the Oct. 19 canonization of seven new saints, Pope Leo said, "the men and women we proclaimed saints yesterday are shining signs of hope for all of us, because they offered their lives in love for Christ and for their brothers and sisters."

"I hope you return to your homelands with hearts filled with gratitude and an ardent desire to imitate the new saints," he told the visitors in the Paul VI Audience Hall Oct. 20.

Speaking about St. Peter To Rot, a martyred lay catechist from Papua New Guinea who was arrested in 1945 during the Japanese occupation in World War II and was killed by lethal injection while in prison, the pope said he offers "an inspiring example of steadfastness and fortitude in preaching the truths of the Gospel when confronted by difficulties and challenges, even threats to our lives."

"Although he was an ordinary catechist, he showed extraordinary courage by risking his life to carry out his apostolate in secret, because his pastoral work was prohibited by the occupying forces," he said. The saint also "firmly defended the sanctity of marriage and even confronted some powerful people" who supported the practice of polygamy.

"May the example of Saint Peter To Rot encourage us to defend the truths of the faith, even at the cost of personal sacrifice, and to rely always on God in our trials," Pope Leo said.

Turning to St. Ignatius Maloyan, the Armenian Catholic archbishop of Mardin who was executed in Turkey in 1915, the pope prayed that his intercession would "renew the fervor of believers and bring fruits of reconciliation and peace for all."

Looking to Venezuela's first two saints -- St. Maria Rendiles Martínez and St. José Gregorio Hernández Cisneros, who were canonized Oct. 19 -- the pope said they were "people very similar to ourselves, who lived facing problems that are not unfamiliar to us."

St. Rendiles, the founder of the Congregation of the Servants of Jesus, was born in Caracas in 1903 and died in 1977. St. Hernández was born in 1864 and became a Third Order Franciscan. A Venezuelan doctor, he became known as "the doctor of the poor," and he was killed in an accident in 1919 on his way to helping a patient.

Following their example, the pope said, the faithful should be motivated by the two saints' trust in God, who "was present in their lives and transformed them" from being "a normal person, like any one of us, into a lamp that illuminated everyone with a new light in their daily lives."

Their acts of charity should also be an inspiration, he added, because charity points to "the true meaning of life and asks us to build it through service, whether to the sick, the poor, or the little ones."

Pope Leo also highlighted the outstanding traits of: St. Vincenza Maria Poloni, founder of the Sisters of Mercy of Verona, Italy, who lived from 1802-1855; St. Maria Troncatti, a Salesian sister born in Italy in 1883, sent as a missionary to Ecuador in 1922 and killed in a plane crash in 1969; and St. Bartolo Longo, an Italian lawyer born in 1841. He had been a militant opponent of the church and involved in the occult, but converted, dedicating himself to charity and to building the Pontifical Shrine of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary of Pompei. He died in 1926.

St. Poloni "bears witness to Jesus' compassion for the sick and marginalized," he said, encouraging the faithful "to persevere in daily service to the most fragile: it is precisely there that holiness of life flourishes!"

Looking at St. Longo, the pope "wholeheartedly" recommended that priests, religious, families and young people pray the saint's prayer to Our Lady of the Rosary. "By contemplating the mysteries of Christ through Mary's eyes, we assimilate the Gospel and learn to put it into practice day by day."