Killed “in hatred of the faith,” a rosary in her hand

Pope Francis moved two 20th-century martyrs a step closer to sainthood, including Veronica Antal, a young Romanian woman killed during an attempted rape in 1958.

Veronica Antal was born in Nisiporesti, a small village in Romania, on Dec. 7, 1935. Because her parents spent a lot of time at work in the fields, she was raised mostly by her grandmother Zarafina, who taught her about the faith and inspired her love of Christ and the Church…

By around the age of 16 or 17, she expressed a desire to enter the monastery, though she was unable to do so because the communist government had already abolished almost all Catholic monasteries in the country. Instead she joined the Secular Franciscans as a tertiary and led a religious life at home, receiving Holy Communion and spending time in adoration daily, though she had to walk five miles to the nearest church.

On Aug. 24, 1958, just a few months shy of her 23rd birthday, she was returning from the Divine Liturgy at the local parish where she had just received the sacrament of Confirmation, when she was attacked by a young man, who attempted in vain to rape her. She died after being stabbed 42 times with a knife.

Antal had a special devotion to the Virgin Mary and prayed the Rosary every day. Those who found her body noted that she had a rosary gripped firmly in her hands.

Hannah Brockhaus, CNA/EWTN News, January 27, 2018