HOLY FAMILY

On December 17, 2022, Pope Francis recognized  the martyrdom of a Polish family killed by the German Nazi occupiers in 1944 for sheltering Jews in an effort to save them from the Holocaust. The decision puts the family on the path to possible sainthood.   (See Blog  Jan.2020). They will be beatified in 2023.

Jozef and Wiktoria Ulma and their seven children  (ages 8 to unborn)  were murdered by the Nazis on March 24, 1944, in Markowa, Poland, for having sheltered Jews during the Second World War.

The Catholic Church officially recognizes their death as “in hatred of the faith.”

On March 24, 1944, the German police entered their home, killed the eight Jews who had taken refuge there, and then shot the couple. The German soldiers then turned their attention to the children, whom they also shot: eight-year-old Stanislas, six-year-old Barbara, five-year-old Władysław, four-year-old Franciszek, three-year-old Antoni, and one-year-old Maria.  The couple was expecting a seventh child, also recognized as a martyr by the Church today.

 In the region, this family was nicknamed “The Samaritans of Markowa.” Jozef and Wiktoria  were recognized in 1995 as “Righteous Among the Nations.”   According to the Yad Vashem memorial, this massacre of the Ulma family “became a symbol of Polish sacrifice and martyrdom during the German occupation.

In 2018, Pope Francis hailed the Ulmas as “an example of faithfulness to God and his commandments, of love for neighbor and of respect for human dignity.”.