(born Matthias DeWitte Ward; March 20, 1918 – June 22, 1999) was an African-American Catholic priest and Franciscan friar who served as a missionary in Brazil for more than forty years.

Raised as a Methodist along with his twelve siblings, Ward later moved with his family to Washington, D.C., where he attended Dunbar High School, from which he graduated in 1939.

[6] Ward left the seminary due to a pulmonary condition and moved to Brooklyn, New York, where he later applied to the Conventual Friars Minor.

Ward quickly learned Portuguese and became an educator in South America, where he also served as a pastor, chaplain, and vocations director.

He was known to entertain his fellow friars and his students with his sharp sense of humor and storytelling, and he often shared his vocation story and health issues and his struggle against anti-Black racism.

His gravesite at the former São Francisco de Assis Seminary in that city has become a place of pilgrimage and the site of two reputed miracles as of 2022.

[9] The local Conventual friars began seeking his canonization and received official permission from Bishop José Eudes Campos do Nascimento of São João del Rei in June 2020.