"Catholic priests martyred by Freemasonic regime in Mexico are powerful witnesses to the faith."
"(LifeSiteNews) — Nearly 100 years ago this week, radical secularist forces led by a brutal Freemason president martyred two heroic Catholic priests in Mexico: St. Cristóbal Magallanes Jara and St. Agustín Caloca Cortés.
The priests, two of many Catholics who courageously suffered martyrdom at the hands of the regime, boldly defied persecution and embodied the dying words of Fr. Caloca: “For God we live and for Him we die!”
Fervent priests who resisted anti-Catholic tyranny
Fr. Magallanes was born in 1869 to poor, devout parents in the state of Jalisco. He worked as a shepherd before joining the seminary without much formal schooling.
Ordained at 30 in Guadalajara, he became the parish priest of his hometown and served as a missionary to indigenous people. The “priest of ardent faith” was a “fervent disseminator of the Rosary of Mary, Most Holy Virgin” and opened catechism centers for the faithful in the country. He also built an orphanage and founded schools and other initiatives to help his flock.
In the early 20th century – throughout much of Fr. Magallanes’ priesthood – the anti-clerical government of Mexico intensely persecuted the Church, seeking to destroy its influence over virtually all aspects of public life.
Despite the country’s illustrious Catholic history and overwhelmingly Catholic population, the regime approved a new constitution in 1917 that abolished religious education, banned the Church from owning property, and heavily restricted priests, limiting their number and requiring them to register with the government. The constitution also denied the Church legal status, deprived priests of civil rights, and banned Church involvement in politics.
The radical provisions, which resemble those of communist regimes, were mostly reformed only in 1992.
Pope Pius XI condemned the explosion of anti-Catholicism in Mexico, writing, “certainly in no place or at no time has it happened before that a small group of men has so outraged the rights of God and of the Church as they are now doing in Mexico, and this without the slightest regard for the past glories of their country, with no feelings of pity for their fellow-citizens.”
“The vows of religious, religious orders, and religious congregations are outlawed in Mexico. Public divine worship is forbidden unless it take place within the confines of a church and is carried on under the watchful eye of the Government. All church buildings have been declared the property of the state,” he decried.
“Priests and laymen have been cruelly put to death in the very streets or in the public squares which front the churches,” the pontiff lamented.
Fr. Magallanes stood strong against the persecution. After the Mexican government shut down the seminary of Guadalajara in 1915, he opened a clandestine one in his parish to relocate seminarians. He soon had 17 students, including the future St. Caloca Cortés, a “model of priestly purity,” who would serve as his vicar and the prefect of the seminary. The two would eventually attain martyrdom together.
Attacks on the Church in Mexico intensified under the presidency of Plutarco Elías Calles, a 33rd degree Freemason, from 1924 to 1928. Calles, who admired Communists and Nazis, began aggressively enforcing the 1917 constitution, closing churches, banning Catholic processions, expelling hundreds of priests, and having some executed, among numerous other abuses.
The atheist president dismissed what he called the “wailing of sacristans” and “the groans of the over-pious.”
Tyranny under Calles sparked the Cristero War or Cristiada (1926–1929), in which Catholics – mostly peasants, including many women and children – rebelled against the Mexican regime, taking up the cries “Viva Cristo Rey!” and “Viva la Virgen de Guadalupe!”
Executed without a trial
Anti-clerical measures – including a ban on priestly attire in public – forced Fr. Magallanes and fellow clergy to minister to the faithful secretly and led to the martyrdoms of Blessed Miguel Agustín Pro, Fr. Francisco Vera, and others.
On May 21, 1927, while on his way to celebrate Mass, Fr. Magallanes was captured and jailed with Fr. Caloca, who was arrested after aiding seminarians who were escaping.
The priests were accused of conspiracy against the government, despite Fr. Magallanes having preached against armed rebellion, and sentenced to death without a trial.
“I die innocent, and ask God that my blood may serve to unite my Mexican brethren,” Fr. Magallanes said, addressing his executioners. He gave his few belongings to the murderers and also gave them absolution.
The captors offered freedom to the younger, 29-year-old Fr. Caloca due to his age, but he refused to go if Fr. Magallanes would not be released as well.
Cardinal Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, the former archbishop of Guadalajara, notes that Fr. Caloca initially fought back against the soldiers and tried to wrestle a gun from one of them. But Fr. Magallanes urged his vicar to stand down, telling him, “Calm down son, in a moment we will be in heaven.”
After absolving each other, the priests were executed together by firing squad on May 25.
“For God we live and for Him we die!” Fr. Caloca shouted.
‘A gift to the universal Church’
In 2000, Pope St. John Paul II canonized them, along with more than 20 other Mexican priests and laymen martyred by the government between 1915 and 1937.
“The Church in Mexico rejoices at relying on these intercessors in heaven, models of supreme charity who followed in the footsteps of Jesus Christ,” he said.
“The firmness of their faith and hope sustained them in the various trials they had to endure. They are a precious legacy, a fruit of the faith rooted in the lands of Mexico,” he added, “a faith which, at the dawn of the third millennium of Christianity, must be preserved and revitalized so that you may continue to be faithful to Christ and to his Church as you were in the past.”
“May the example of these new saints, a gift of the Church in Mexico to the universal Church, spur all the faithful, using all the means within their reach and especially with the help of God’s grace, to seek holiness with courage and determination,” the pope said.
The Church celebrates Fr. Magallanes and his 24 companions on May 21.
In addition to Fr. Caloca, the other martyrs include Frs. Romano Adame, Rodrigo Aguilar, Giulio Álvarez, Luigi Batis Sáinz, Matteo Correa, Attilano Cruz, Michele de la Mora, Pietro Esqueda Ramírez, Margarito Flores, Giuseppe Isabel Flores, Davide Galván, Pietro Maldonado, Jesus Méndez, Giustino Orona, Saba Reyes, Giuseppe Maria Robles, Turibio Romo, Gennaro Sánchez Delgaldillo, Tranquillino Ubiarco and Davide Uribe; as well as laymen Emanuele Morales, Salvatore Lara Puente and Davide Roldán Lara."
Fr. Cristóbal Magallanes, Fr. Agustín Caloca, and the Cristero martyrs, pray for us!
