Beatification date announced for married couple with seven children martyred by Nazis

Rome Newsroom, Feb 15, 2023 / 04:00 am

The beatification date has been announced for Józef and Wiktoria Ulma and their seven children, who were killed by the Nazis for hiding a Jewish family in their home in Poland.

The Archdiocese of Przemyska announced Tuesday that the entire Ulma family — including one newborn baby — will be beatified on Sept. 10.

Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, the prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, will preside over the beatification ceremony in Markowa, the village in southeast Poland where the Ulma family was executed in 1944.

Pope Francis recognized the martyrdom of the couple and their children in a decree signed in December. The World Holocaust Remembrance Center has honored the Ulmas as Righteous Among the Nations for the sacrifice of their lives.

Early on March 24, 1944, a Nazi patrol surrounded the home of Józef and Wiktoria Ulma on the outskirts of the village of Markowa in southeast Poland. They discovered eight Jewish people who had found refuge on the Ulma farm and executed them.

The Nazi police then killed Wiktoria, who was seven months pregnant and gave birth, and Józef. As children began to scream at the sight of their murdered parents, the Nazis shot them too: Stanisława, age 8, Barbara, 7, Władysław, 6, Franciszek, 4, Antoni, 3, and Maria, 2.

Father Witold Burda, the postulator for the Ulma family, has said that a Bible was found inside the Ulma house in which the parable of the Good Samaritan had been underlined in a red pen.

The postulator added that Józef and Wiktoria were known in their community for being “willing to help anyone who knocked on their door.”

“They built their family on the foundation of faith with fidelity to the two essential commandments: the commandment to love God and the commandment to love one’s neighbor,” Burda said.

This article was updated on Sept. 6, 2023.