September 20 is the feast of Blessed Teresa Cejudo Redondo de Caballero: lay Salesian, wife, mother, and martyr of the Spanish Civil War—murdered by Communist forces on this day in 1936. She was beatified on October 28, 2007 by His Holiness Benedict XVI.
Brief Biography of Blessed Teresa Cejudo Redondo de Caballero
Blessed Teresa CejudoRedondo de Caballero was born in October 1890 in Pozoblanco, Córdoba, Spain and attended the College of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. She married the architect Juan Caballero Cabrera in 1925 and the couple had one daughter. Blessed Teresa was a model wife and mother.
Blessed Teresa served as president of the Women of Catholic Action, a member of the Saint Vincent de Paul Society and a Salesian Cooperator. She was very active at the Salesian school in her town and helped distribute food to the poor and taught children unable to attend school to read and write.
The Communists began persecuting Catholics in July 1936. On August 22, 1936, the parish priest, Blessed Antonio Rodríguez Blanco was murdered. Six days later, Teresa was arrested and taken to prison because she was a devout Catholic. There she remained serene and calm, encouraging those who with her were in jail. She demonstrated extraordinary kindness and charity to her fellow prisoners.
On September 16, Blessed Teresa Cejudo Redondo de Caballero was tried and accused of political propaganda against Marxist ideas. She was sentenced to death, along with seventeen other faithful Catholics. On September 20, after saying goodbye to her two sisters and hugging her ten-year-old daughter, she was executed. She wanted to be the last to die in order to uplift and inspire her fellow martyrs, reminding them of the promise of eternal life. Blessed Teresa refused to have her eyes bandaged, because she did not fear death. Her last words were: “I forgive you, brothers! Long live Christ the King! ”
Blessed Teresa Cejudo Redondo de Caballero, pray for us!
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