Three French clerics, including desert hermit Charles de Foucauld, have been canonized by Pope Francis in Rome

Qome 45,000 faithful from all over the world gathered for the occasion on Sunday in St. Peter’s Square in Rome.

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They came in large numbers for the canonization of ten figures of the Church. Some 45,000 faithful from all over the world gathered on Sunday, May 15, in St. Peter’s Square in Rome. Pope Francis has proclaimed ten figures of the Catholic Church “saints”, including three French religious. Arrived by car, the sovereign pontiff presided over this canonization mass (the first since the pandemic) alongside around fifty cardinals and 2,000 priests and bishops.

Among these ten “canonized” are the French monks the hermit of the desert Charles de Foucauld, Marie Rivier (1768-1838) and César de Bus (1544-1607) as well as the Dutch priest and journalist Titus Brandsma, known for his commitment against Nazi propaganda during World War II and killed at Dachau in 1942.

The beatification trial of Charles de Foucauld, who was assassinated in 1916 in Tamanrasset, in the Algerian desert south, began in the 1930s. He was declared “blessed” in 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI.


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