From the autumn of 1914 Franz Reinisch and his brother visited Andreas Gymnasium of the Franciscans in Tyrol.

Franz Reinisch began to study law on 28 September 1922 at the Leopold-Franzens University in Innsbruck.

[1] Here he first had contact with the Pallottines and engaged in a close friendship with priest Richard Weickgenannt SAC.

The highlight of this pilgrimage was a papal audience with Pope Pius XI on Christmas Eve 1926.

Five years later, in 1938, after several transfers to Konstanz, Hohenrechberg, to the St. Paul Home in Bruchsal, Salzburg and Untermerzbach, he finally came to Schoenstatt.

[4] His troubles with the law began when the Gestapo became aware of his speeches in which he openly addressed the incompatibility of Christianity with the ideas of the Nazi regime.

[3] He took up work for the church by translating ecclesiastical messages and texts from Italian into German magazines.

After the death of Reich President Paul von Hindenburg in August 1934, the military oath formula was changed.

On 15 April 1942, Reinisch arrived a day later than ordered in the barracks in Bad Kissingen and immediately declared his refusal to swear the oath of allegiance to Hitler.

[6] His trial dragged on, so he was brought in May to the Tegel Prison, where the chaplain denied him the holy communion for failing to perform his duty.

In prison he wrote the poem You're the Great People, as a dirge in anticipation of a death sentence.

At 3 a.m., he gave all he had to his family, including a cloth in which the Eucharist was wrapped, his crucifix and rosary, some books and his farewell letter.

At 3:30 his shoes and socks were taken off, his hands were tied behind his back, and he was led to the basement execution chamber where, at 5:03, he was beheaded by guillotine.

Reinisch's attitude encouraged Blessed Franz Jägerstätter in his decision to refuse military service, for which he was executed in 1943.

The beatification process of Franz Reinisch commenced in Trier on 28 May 2013 in the presence of the local bishop Stephan Ackermann and concluded on diocesan level on 28 June 2019.

In his native town of Feldkirch the Franz-Reinisch-Weg is named after him, and in Innsbruck/Wilten, a road plaque marks the Pater-Reinisch-Weg since 1983.