“There are no words capable of expressing the richness of life, sacrifice, courage, and readiness to fight for one’s values demonstrated by the nine Salesians beatified today,” President Karol Nawrocki said during the beatification Mass of nine Salesian priests at the Sanctuary of St. John Paul II in Kraków.
Beatification of nine Salesians – martyrs of World War II
Today, a beatification Mass was held at the Sanctuary of St. John Paul II in Kraków for the following Salesian priests: Jan Świerc, Ignacy Antonowicz, Ignacy Dobiasz, Karol Golda, Franciszek Harazim, Franciszek Miśka, Ludwik Mroczek, Włodzimierz Szembek, and Kazimierz Wojciechowski. They were killed between 1941 and 1942 in the German Nazi concentration camps of Auschwitz and Dachau. The priests were recognized as victims of wartime persecution, murdered in odium fidei (“out of hatred for the faith”). The decree recognizing their martyrdom was approved by Pope Leo XIV in October 2025.
President of Poland Karol Nawrocki delivered an address during the beatification Mass.
“There are no words capable of expressing the richness of life, sacrifice, courage, and readiness to fight for their values demonstrated by the nine Salesians beatified today,” the president said.
Nawrocki emphasized that the beatification ceremony is a testament to what Christian values truly mean in practice: love, mercy, service to others, and a willingness to make the ultimate sacrifice.
“If anyone still doubts it, they should read the biographies of the nine Salesians beatified today and see what Christian values truly mean: love, mercy, service to others, and readiness for the greatest sacrifices in the face of the catastrophe of the Second World War,” he stressed.
“Thinking of God, they brought so much good to our beloved homeland”
The president recalled that the Salesians had carried out their mission in Polish lands even during the period when Poland did not exist on the map of Europe. As he noted, four of the nine beatified priests were born in the nineteenth century, and all nine were born before Poland regained its independence.
“I am deeply grateful to these martyrs for the fact that, while thinking of God, they brought so much good to our beloved homeland. I would also like to thank the Salesians for the sensitivity that has repeatedly helped save the Republic of Poland. It was this sensitivity that gave us the steadfast Primate Hlond, who, in the face of two totalitarian systems, became not only the head of the Catholic Church but also a source of hope for the suffering Polish nation. This same sensitivity also gave us the greatest figure of the twentieth century, St. John Paul II,”
Nawrocki said.
The president stressed that “the Salesian spirit has given our homeland great patrons and outstanding figures in our history.”
“I thank you and express my gratitude that today this same sensitivity, through my chaplain Fr. Prof. Jarosław Wąsowicz, is being brought into the Presidential Palace and enriches me as President. God bless you,”
the head of state said.
During his speech, the president also referred to one of the newly beatified priests:
“One of those beatified today, Karol Golda, a man born in Tychy, who spoke four languages and lost his life because he heard the confession of a German SS man, was murdered in the German concentration camp Auschwitz. He had a motto in life.”
“He would repeat: ‘I must strive upward.’ We may all see these words as a beautiful profession of faith, reminding us that our time on earth is brief. As a historian, however, I would also like to say that Fr. Karol’s words served as a kind of vaccine against the two totalitarian systems of that era, which, though seemingly different, understood each other perfectly when it came to fighting faith, religion, and God. We thank them for overcoming the system of German Nazism through their faith, hope, love, mercy, and devotion to Christian values. They were with us then, and they remain with us today. May God bless Poland,”
he concluded.
Before the Mass, the President of Poland, accompanied by a military honor guard, laid wreaths at the sarcophagi of the late President Lech Kaczyński and the late First Lady Maria Kaczyńska, as well as at the tomb of Marshal Józef Piłsudski in the Crypt beneath the Silver Bells Tower of Wawel Cathedral.
Arrests, persecution, and martyrdom
On May 23, 1941, the Gestapo arrested the Salesian priests residing in the religious house in the Dębniki district of Kraków. They were taken to Montelupich Prison and later transferred to Auschwitz concentration camp in June. Among them were Fr. Jan Świerc (1877–1941), parish priest of St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in Kraków and director of the local Salesian community, Fr. Ignacy Antonowicz (1890–1941), Fr. Ignacy Dobiasz (1880–1941), Fr. Franciszek Harazim (1885–1941), and Fr. Kazimierz Wojciechowski (1904–1941). They died as a result of brutal torture in the camp during June and July 1941.
The nine Salesians belong to a group of 122 individuals whose beatification cause was opened on September 17, 2003, as part of the second beatification process for Polish martyrs of World War II. The diocesan phase concluded in Pelplin on May 24, 2011, and the documentation was subsequently sent to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in Rome.
In March 2023, historical consultants of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints issued a positive opinion regarding Fr. Jan Świerc and his eight companions, priests of the Society of St. Francis de Sales, who were murdered in odium fide, “out of hatred for the faith”, in German Nazi concentration camps between 1941 and 1942.