By learning story of Spanish martyrs, ‘we will recover evangelical strength,’ bishop says

ACI Prensa Staff, Nov 5, 2025 / 09:00 am

Following the publication of his Spanish-language book on the 1934 revolution that took place in Asturias province in northwestern Spain, Auxiliary Bishop Juan Antonio Martínez Camino of Madrid noted that “if we know the history of the martyrs, we will recover evangelical strength.”

In “The 39 Martyrs of 1934 in Spain,” Martínez recounts the stories of those who were murdered out of hatred for the faith within a very specific context in the country’s history.

In October 1934, the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE by its Spanish acronym) along with anarchist and communist groups launched an uprising against the legality of the Second Spanish Republic, hoping to emulate the revolution that triumphed in Russia in 1917.

Among those martyred in the conflict — 37 religious and two laypeople — were nine De La Salle Brothers, seven diocesan seminarians and three of their formators, three Vincentian missionaries, two Jesuits, one Carmelite, and one Passionist.

Most were killed in Asturias, but not all. A Marist brother and a diocesan priest were killed in Palencia; another priest in Barcelona; and a lay member of the National Catholic Association of Propagandists (Advocates) in Gipuzkoa.

The martyrs: A ‘living Gospel’

Just days before the liturgical memorial of the 20th-century martyrs in Spain on Nov. 6, the prelate told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, that the book’s main motivation is to make the lives and final sacrifices of these martyrs known to new generations. He said he hopes that “a call to awaken our faith, perhaps dormant,” goes forth, as Archbishop Sanz Montes of Oviedo points out in the book’s prologue.

There is a second motivation for the book, he said, which is to denounce “a neo-pagan culture that frustrates the desires of human beings and of new generations; a culture that has been developing in Europe for two or three centuries and is now at its peak.”

This culture is characterized by being “closed to true life from God and is centered on the myth of self-salvation, on the myth of progress,” he explained.

Martínez emphasized that telling the stories of the martyrs is not “primarily to illustrate an already well-established Christian doctrine but rather to highlight the essence of Christianity, which is the history of Christ and his witnesses.”

The author said “the martyrs and saints are the living presence of Christ in the history of each era. They are, therefore, the first evangelizers.”

“To read the lives of the saints and martyrs is to read the living Gospel,” he noted.

‘Martyrs of the revolution, not of the war’

The prelate explained that throughout all of Spain within a 15-year period (which extended beyond the time of the 1936–1939 Spanish Civil War), 4,235 clerics were martyred, including 12 bishops.

In addition, 3,500 male religious and friars and almost 300 nuns were killed. Added to these, some estimate that up to 10,000 laypeople may have been killed for their faith.

Of all the martyrs, some 3,000 are at different stages of the beatification process.

Martínez, who owes part of his vocation to the memory of his uncle, Lázaro San Martín Camino, who was martyred in 1936, states in the book that “they are martyrs of the revolution, not of the war.”

“Neither the republic nor the war, as such, were directly the cause of their martyrdom,” but rather “the cause of martyrdom in Spain is the anarcho-Marxist revolution,” which, like other totalitarian ideologies in the 20th century, “included in its program the annihilation of faith, religion, and the Christian Church.”

In the Jubilee Year 2000, St. John Paul II convened an ecumenical event held in the Colosseum of Rome in memory of the 20th century martyrs, which covered everything from the martyrdom of the Armenians in Turkey in 1915 to the waning years of communism at the century’s end.

Although crimes against religious freedom in Spain, and especially against Catholics, are increasing year after year and have even resulted in bloodshed, as in the case of sacristan Diego Valencia, according to reports prepared by specialists, Martínez warned against hasty interpretations.

“We must understand this lesson well to understand the present,” he said, alluding to the martyrdoms of the 20th century. “If we mix everything up, we understand nothing. We must proceed step by step. And we cannot conflate the martyrdom of the 20th century with the martyrdom of the 21st century.”

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.