Amidst the disorder caused by the military coup of July 1936, many supporters of the Republican government pointed their weapons against individuals they considered local reactionaries, including priests and nuns.
During the Spanish Civil War of 1936–1939, and especially in the early months of the conflict, individual clergymen were executed while entire religious communities were persecuted, leading to a death toll of 13 bishops, 4,172 diocesan priests and seminarians, 2,364 monks and friars and 283 nuns, for a total of 6,832 clerical victims, as part of what is referred to as Spain's Red Terror.
[7] Regarding the selection of Candidates, Archbishop Edward Novack from the Congregation of Saints explained in an interview with L'Osservatore Romano: "Ideologies such as Nazism or Communism serve as a context of martyrdom, but in the foreground the person stands out with his conduct, and, case by case, it is important that the people among whom the person lived should affirm and recognize his fame as a martyr and then pray to him, obtaining graces.
[10] In this group of people, the Vatican has not included all Spanish martyrs, nor any of the 16 priests who were executed by the nationalist side in the first years of the war.
The act of beatification has also coincided in time with the debate on the Law of Historical Memory (about the treatment of the victims of the war and its aftermath) promoted by the Spanish Government.
The Spanish government has supported the beatifications, sending Foreign Minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos to attend the ceremony.
[13] Among those present was Juan Andrés Torres Mora, a relative of one of the martyrs and the Spanish MP who had debated the memory law for PSOE.
Some objectors oppose the notion of these priests being killed for mere religious hatred and, while not excusing their brutal murders, putting them in the context of the historical moment.
[citation needed] Of the first objection, one of the most notable cases has centered on Cruz Laplana y Laguna, Bishop of Cuenca, a well-known supporter of the monarchist regime.
After the proclamation of the Second Republic he carried out a number of right-wing political campaigns throughout the province, and had established close contacts with military officials such as General Joaquín Fanjul, a supporter of the Nationalist rebellion.
In 1936 he personally endorsed Falangista leader José Antonio Primo de Rivera as a candidate in the 1936 local elections.
Over several days before the uprising, Father Fulgencio met with these landowners in the village casino—the hub of social life for the local elites in rural Spain—to organize support for the rebellion.
Rigoberto Domenech, Archbishop of Zaragoza, declared publicly on 11 August 1936 that the military uprising was to be supported, and its defensive actions approved, because "it is not done in the service of anarchy, but in the benefit of order, fatherland, and religion" in response to the Red Terror.
Another statement was that given in November 1938 by Leopoldo Eijo Garay, Bishop of Madrid-Alcalá, regarding a possible truce between Republican and rebel forces: "To tolerate democratic liberalism... would be to betray the martyrs".
[22] Of the second, the controversy surrounding the beatification of Augustinian Friar Gabino Olaso Zabala, listed as a companion of Avelino Rodriguez Alonso, concerns his previous life.
Olaso had been a missionary in the Philippines during the Katipunan rebellion against Spanish rule, and had been accused of torturing Friar Mariano Dacanay, an alleged rebel sympathizer.
It also misunderstands the nature of a cause for martyrdom, where the primary factor is the person's death due to religious hatred of the faith, rather than the saintliness of his previous life.
It continues in a belligerent role in its unusual answer to the Historical Memory Law by recurring to the beatification of 498 "martyrs" of the Civil War.
The priests executed by Franco's Army are not counted among them... Its selective criteria regarding the religious persons that were part of its ranks are difficult to fathom.
Saint Innocencio of Mary Immaculate, born Emanuele Canoura Arnau, was a member of the Passionist Congregation and martyr of the Spanish Civil War.
Born on 10 March 1887 in Santa Cecelia del Valle de Oro in Galicia, Spain, he died at Turon, with his eight companions, on 9 October 1934.
Joined the Brothers of the Christian Schools at age 19, entering the novitiate on 24 February 1917 at Irun, Spain, taking the name Jaime Hilario.
However, his hearing problems grew worse, and in the early 1930s, he was forced to retire from teaching, and began work in the garden at the La Salle house at San Jose, Tarragona, Spain.
Imprisoned in July 1936 at Mollerosa, Spain when the Spanish Civil War broke out and religious people were swept from the street.
First of the 97 La Salle Brothers killed in Catalonia, Spain during the Spanish Civil War to be recognized as a martyr.