Giovanni Fausti

Fr. Giovanni Fausti SJ (born October 19, 1899 in Brozzo near Brescia , † March 4, 1946 in Shkodra ) was an Italian Jesuit priest who was sent to Albania as a missionary, where he was arrested and executed for his faith. He is one of the Thirty-Eight Martyrs of Albania .

Life

Giovanni Fausti was born as the eldest of twelve children to his parents Paulo Antonio Fausti and Maria Sigolini. The respected Italian family was firmly rooted in the faith; the parents reported that they did not turn away a beggar.

At school he was one of the best students in his class. During his school days he became friends with Giovanni Battista Montini, who later became Pope Paul VI . Giovanni Fausti was distinguished by great piety, so that his uncle Umberto Sigoline saw in him the future priest at an early age. After finishing school, Giovanni attended the diocesan seminary in Brescia. He was ordained a priest on July 9, 1922. He continued to study philosophy, including at the Gregoriana . On October 30, 1924, he entered the Jesuit novitiate . In 1929 he was appointed lecturer for the seminary in Shkodra, where he initially taught theology and later philosophy. In 1932 he first returned to Italy, where he went through some medical treatments and took a chair in Mantua . In 1942 he came back to Albania, now as superior, first as a professor in Shkodra, until he became vice provincial of the Jesuits there in 1945 , whereby his place of work shifted to Tirana .

On the evening of December 31, 1945, after the “ Te Deum ” at the end of the year, he was arrested with Fr. Daniel Dajani . Under false accusation - the State Security saw the two fathers as the leader of the “Albanian Union” and assumed that they had induced some seminarians to act in a canonically illegal manner - the death sentences for them and other defendants were pronounced on February 22, 1946 . Enver Hoxha's verdict was confirmed on March 2 . On March 4, 1946, Fr. Giovanni Fausti, Fr. Daniel Dajani, the priest Gjon Shllaku , the seminarist Mark Çuni , the seminarian Gjergj Bici and the three lay people Gjelosh Lulashi , Qerim Sadiku and Gjon Vata were buried in the dump behind the Catholic cemetery of Ramaj (near Shkodra) shot . The men had to hold hands, the bodies then remained lying on top of each other.

Act

Fr. Giovanni Fausti was not only considered an excellent professor, but also a person who “distinguished himself through a lot of culture and piety”, as it is called in Albanian memoirs. He showed particular commitment to the dialogue between Christianity and Islam , as one of the first in the wider community.

last words

He tried to comfort himself and his fellow convicts with a psalm phrase: “We are entering the house of God.” The last words that have come down to us are: “I am happy that death comes to me now in the exercise of my duty. Greet the Jesuits, the deacons, collaborators in the apostolate and the Archbishop for me. Long live Christ the King! "

beatification

The beatification of Giovanni Fausti and 37 other martyrs took place on November 5, 2016 in Shkodra. The Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints , Cardinal Angelo Amato , presided over the celebrations on behalf of Pope Francis .

literature

• Markus WE Peters: History of the Catholic Church in Albania 1919-1993. Wiesbaden 2003, ISBN 3-447-04784-4 .
• Pjetër Pepa: Tragjedia dhe Lavdia e Klerit Katolik në Shqipëri. Tirana 2007, Vol. II.

Web links

• Portrait of Giovanni Faustis on the website of the Archdiocese of Shkodra-Pult (in Albanian)
• Portrait of Giovanni Fausti on the Santi Beati website (in Italian)