Saint Rafael Guízar y Valencia

He was born at Cotija, in Michoacán, in the diocese of Zamora, on April 26, 1878, one of eleven children of Prudencio and Natividad, whom the Holy See biography calls devout Christians. ²⁵ His mother died when he was nine. ²⁴⁵ He studied at a parish school and then with the Jesuits, entered the minor seminary at Cotija in 1891 and the major seminary at Zamora in 1896, and was ordained a priest in June 1901, at 23. ²⁴

He spent his first years as a priest preaching missions in Zamora and in other regions of Mexico. ² In 1905 he was named spiritual director of the seminary at Zamora, where, the Holy See says, he worked to form the students in love of the Eucharist and devotion to the Virgin Mary. ²

In 1911, to answer the persecution of the Church, he founded a religious newspaper; ACI Prensa places it in Mexico City. ²⁴ The revolution soon put it out of business, and the Holy See says he was hunted from then until his death and lived for years with no fixed home. ²

To keep up his ministry he disguised himself as a street seller, a musician and "a doctor of homeopathic medicine", and in that way reached the sick and the dying with the sacraments. ²⁵ The Marian Fathers say that in 1915 the authorities issued an order for him to be shot on sight. ⁵ He stayed in the southern United States until the end of 1915. ²

Where he went next depends on the source. The Holy See and the Marian Fathers say Guatemala, where he preached many missions, and then Cuba; ACI Prensa says Nicaragua and then Cuba. ²⁴⁵ In Cuba, the Holy See says, his charity toward "the victims of the black plague in 1919" was exemplary. ²

He was elected bishop of Veracruz on August 1, 1919, while still in Cuba, and consecrated in the cathedral of Havana on November 30, 1919. ² The Archdiocese of Xalapa says Pope Benedict XV named him, and that he reached Veracruz on January 3, 1920; the Holy See says he took possession of his diocese on January 9. ²³ The archdiocese counts him as the fifth bishop of Veracruz. ³

He spent his first two years visiting the whole of his vast diocese in person, preaching, teaching the catechism, validating marriages and hearing confessions. ² Soon after he arrived, a severe earthquake struck Veracruz, and ACI Prensa says the new bishop found himself organizing and leading the relief for its victims. ²⁴

Benedict XVI said he renounced his own goods and never accepted the gifts of the powerful, or gave them back at once, and so had something to give the poor. ¹ He was an untiring preacher of popular missions, using a "Catechism of Christian Doctrine" of his own. ¹

The formation of priests came first. In 1921 he recovered and renovated the old seminary of Xalapa, confiscated in 1914, and the government seized it again soon after the work was done. ² He then moved the seminary to Mexico City, where it ran in secret for fifteen years with three hundred students, and the Holy See says it was the only seminary that stayed open in those years of persecution. ²⁴

Benedict XVI said he called the seminary "the apple of his eye", and quoted what he used to say: "A Bishop can do without the mitre, the crosier and even without the cathedral, but he cannot do without the seminary, since the future of his Diocese depends on it". ¹ ACI Prensa gives the same saying in Spanish. ⁴

Of his years as bishop, nine were spent in exile or fleeing for his life. ²⁴ The Marian Fathers say the persecution that began in 1926 drove him out again and that he could not return to Veracruz until 1929. ⁵ The Holy See records that at one point he wanted to give himself up to his persecutors in exchange for freedom of worship. ²

In December 1937, while preaching a mission at Córdoba, in Veracruz, he suffered a heart attack and never left his bed again. ²⁴ From it he went on governing the diocese and the seminary, and he said Mass every day. ² He died in Mexico City on June 6, 1938, and was buried the next day at Xalapa, in a funeral the Holy See calls triumphant, with everyone wanting a last look at "the Saintly Bishop Guízar". ²⁴

The Archdiocese of Xalapa says he was first buried in the city's Cinco de Mayo cemetery, and that twelve years later his body was found incorrupt and moved to the cathedral, where his tomb now draws thousands of pilgrims. ³ It records the miracle for his beatification as a woman genetically unable to conceive who bore a child, and the miracle for his canonization as a child diagnosed in the womb with a cleft palate and lip who was born completely healthy after his parents asked his intercession. ³

John Paul II beatified him in St. Peter's on January 29, 1995. ² Benedict XVI signed the decree on the second miracle on April 28, 2006, and canonized him on October 15, 2006, with Filippo Smaldone, Rose Venerini and Théodore Guérin. ¹² He held him up to bishops and priests as a call to make the promotion and formation of priestly and religious vocations fundamental. ¹

ACI Prensa calls him the patron of the bishops of Mexico. ⁴ It is the only source consulted for this page that names a patronage. ¹²³⁴⁵ People call him "Bishop of the poor", the name Benedict XVI used at his canonization, and ACI Prensa adds that they speak of him as "the Saintly Bishop Guízar". ¹⁴

The sources give two dates. The Archdiocese of Xalapa and ACI Prensa say the Church celebrates his feast on October 24. ³⁴ The Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception give June 6, the anniversary of his death in 1938. ²⁵ Both are shown here.

At Xalapa, the archdiocese says, pilgrims come to the cathedral chiefly on October 23 and 24, and a novena of celebrations honors what it calls his great loves: the Eucharist, the Virgin Mary, the missions, the seminary, children, the poor, the sacrament of reconciliation, Christian doctrine and the sick. ³

For years his ministry depended on not being recognized. He went to the sick dressed as a peddler, a musician or a homeopath, so that he could give them the sacraments. ²⁴

As bishop he spent nine years in exile or on the run, and never stopped running a seminary that could not stay in its own building. ² He said a bishop could do without a cathedral but not without a seminary. ¹

Benedict XVI read his life against that Sunday's Gospel of the rich young man, who would not leave his riches: here was a man who renounced his goods and handed back the gifts of the powerful. ¹ That, the pope said, is how he was able to help the poor. ¹

He was bedridden for his last six months and went on governing from his bed. ² The Holy See also records that he once offered to hand himself over to his persecutors if they would let the Church worship freely. ²