After celebrating Mass for the Jubilee of Catechists today, Pope Francis recalled that on Saturday in Germany, a priest killed in Dachau was beatified.
Mariannhill Missionary Fr Engelmar Unzeitig (1911-1945) was sent to Dachau for defending Jews from the pulpit. At the concentration camp, he ministered to the other prisoners and became known as the “Angel of Dachau.”
In noting the beatification before praying the midday Angelus today, the Pope spoke of Fr. Unzeitig as a priest who “opposed hate with love and cruelty with meekness.” He prayed that his testimony might help us to be “testimonies of charity and hope, even in the midst of tribulations.”
World Day of the Deaf
The Pope also noted that today is the World Day of the Deaf.
The World Federation of the Deaf initiated the International Day in 1958, and chose the last Sunday in September to commemorate that the first World Congress of the WFD took place in September 1951.
“I wish to greet all deaf people here present or represented,” the Pope said, “and encourage them to give their contribution so that the Church and society are ever more capable of welcoming all.”
The Pope concluded his words before the Angelus with another greeting to the catechists present for the jubilee celebrations, saying, “Thank you for your work in the Church at the service of evangelization and the transmission of the faith. May the Virgin Mary help you to persevere in the journey of faith and to give testimony in your lives to what you teach in catechesis.”
