December 1
Maria Clementina Anwarité (1939–1964)
Nun
Practical advice
When collecting your heart in silence, go to the Virgin with filial trust and tell her a specific concern, doing everything for the love of God.
Biography
A native of Zaire, she belonged to the Congregation of the Holy Family. In the tragic years of the revolts, especially in 1964, 20 nuns were murdered. María Clementina was the youngest and the only African. Colonel Pierre Olombe ordered her death because she did not want to agree to become his concubine. As he was drugged, this man stabbed her to death, while she screamed: “Father, forgive them because they don't know what they are doing!” When the colonel's effects of the drug wore off, he asked for forgiveness from the nuns of the Congregation of Mary Clementina, and they said that they forgave him, that he should ask God for forgiveness.