Pedro de San José Betancur (1626–1667)

Biography

He was not a clergyman, he was not a knight, he barely carried what was necessary to cover himself, and he had no friends, but he went to America with the holy ambition of preaching Christ. He soon discovered it in the poorest and sickest of the city. Kneeling before the Child Jesus, the Blessed Virgin and Saint Joseph, Peter explained out loud all the miseries and needs of those men and women, of those children. For him there were no social distinctions, only souls that could lose the only important and decisive business: the business of their salvation. His charity did not give him rest. His hope and his faith kept him awake, his ear attentive to the pain. Peter, a homeless man without bread, fed the hungry and clothed the naked. He went to the rich and bringing the flame of his charity to them, he melted their selfishness and ignited the generosity of those men. His figure seduced: men and women were prepared to follow his example, and thus he was able to found the Bethlehem Order, testimony of his love for the contemplation of Bethlehem, of the Child God. He founded the first nursery school that records the history of education in Central America. Brother Pedro was the living testimony of what the Church has done and does for the poor, the forgotten, the orphan, in two thousand years of history. At the same time he taught what to do and how to do it, which is to act with the Church and in accordance with the Church. On July 30, 2002, Pope John Paul II declared him a saint. Since his beatification on June 22, 1980, his spirit is present in an extraordinary way in the "Social Works of Brother Pedro", in Antigua Guatemala.