Pope Francis recognized the beatification in Brazil on December 10, 2022, of a young woman who was killed “in odium fidei” at just age 20.
Isabel Cristina Mrad Campos is seen as a “Maria Goretti” of Brazil.
The Pope noted how she was killed recently, in 1982, “in hatred of the faith, for defending her dignity as a woman and the value of chastity.”
May her heroic example stimulate young people in particular to give a generous witness of faith and adherence to the Gospel. Let us applaud the new Blessed!
You can learn about Blessed Isabel Cristina in the article below:
Martyrs
The Pope spoke of her as a martyr, saying she died “in hatred of the faith.”
Catholic Culture defines a martyr as “A person who chooses to suffer, even to die, rather than renounce his or her faith or Christian principles.”
As noted in this review of the designation of “martyr of purity”:
To be declared a martyr, someone must either die for the faith directly, or die in defense of a Christian virtue.
But the virtue of chastity does not require that a person choose death over rape. The Church does not value virginity over life. So why would the [choice of these martyrs] be celebrated by the Church as a model of chastity?
The answer is that [these martyrs’] death was a reflection of [their] life. Living virtuously developed in [them] the “habit of excellence” that Aristotle described. Though young, [they] had an abhorrence of sin so deeply developed that when confronted with impurity, even though the sin was not [theirs, they] fled from it.
