NEWS & VIEWS
from a CATHOLIC perspective

      ROME, 17 (NE) Sunday Blessed Marcelino Champagnat, Blessed Giovanni Calabria and Blessed Agostina Livia Petrantoni were canonized by Pope John Paul II. The canonization, announced last 9th of January, took place Sunday April 18.

      Blessed Marcelino Champagnat was born in a town near Lyon, France, in 1789, on the eve of French Revolution. In 1817 he founded the Brothers of Mary or Marist Brothers, for the education of young people. They grew admirably and extended their evangelizing and educative labor on the whole world. Champagnat was beatified by pope Pius XII in 1955.

      Father Giovanni Calabria was born in Verona, Italia in 1873. He founded the Congregations of the Poor Servants of Divine Mercy, with masculine and feminine branches. They expanded in Italy, Angola and South America. He was called to the House of the Father in 1954.

      Blessed Agostina Livia Petrantoni, also of Italian origin, founded the Sisters of Charity. She lived from 1864 until 1913, when, working as a nurse, she was murdered by one of her patients in a fit of madness.