Blessed Father Jean François Mache, Polish honor guard
In November 2021, the Honor Guard was enriched with a new blessed. Father Jean François Macha, member of the Guard of Honor, was beatified in the Cathedral of Christ the King in Katowice. There solemn mass was presided over by the Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.
The new blessed was born in 1914 into a family full of love. THE little Jean is, from the beginning of his life, aware of caring for his neighbor, and it is quite natural that he turns to the priesthood. Very early on, he understood that “only faith and charity make it possible to recognize in each person, created in the image and likeness of God, its own inalienable dignity. » Assigned as vicar to the parish of Saint Joseph in Ruda Śląska, in the middle of war, he founded a charity called “Konvalia” , to bring moral or material comfort to all those who, from a one way or another, were victims of the war through mourning, hunger or poverty.
Cardinal Semeraro recalls how precious his example is today: “He did not care about differences of nationality, religion religious or social level, because we will all be judged on love. » But all this charity, this overflowing and gratuitous love for others, is not hardly to the taste of the Nazis. Not to mention that the priest continues to challenge them by refusing to celebrate mass in German, as they had imposed.
Father Macha was arrested on September 5, 1941, and ten months later, after months of imprisonment and torture to try to make him give in, to make him renounce the faith and the pastoral choice which were the driving force of his life, the death sentence is pronounced. “He never felt abandoned, 12 recalled the cardinal, he died to bear fruit, so that the life of Jesus could be manifested in his mortal body.
In his last letter to his family, he wrote: “Do not despair! Everything will be fine GOOD ! Without a tree, the forest will become a forest. Without a swallow, the Spring will also come and without a man the world will not collapse.” He was guillotined on the night of December 3, 1942.
The teaching of the new blessed is obviously addressed to everyone, but especially to priests and seminarians who, following his example, can bring “ the fruit of the gift of holy vocations to the service of this good and persevering because his martyrdom, underlines Cardinal Semeraro, is also a invitation to stay with the Lord, to seek him in prayer and dialogue interior, to glorify him with a holy life.”
In Poland the number of members of the Guard of Honor and its 425 lead in the world. This year, on the occasion of the 160th anniversary, all managers of the centers gathered for a large work session and consultation. The Sisters of the Visitation of Krakow are the linchpin at the level national. It is also the only country where the Association has official representation at the Episcopal Conference through Monsignor Stanislaw Salaterski.