Servant of God Pedro Ballester, Finding Christ in Ordinary Life and Suffering

Servant of God Pedro Ballester

Pedro Ballester Arenas was born in Manchester, England, on May 22, 1996, to Spanish parents, Pedro and Esperanza. His father was a doctor, and Pedro grew up with two younger brothers, Carlos and Javier. Their Catholic faith shaped family life through Mass, prayer, and the Rosary. The three brothers served as altar boys and developed close friendships with one another. As the family moved between communities in northern England, Pedro carried this foundation of faith into new schools, friendships, and responsibilities.

He was intelligent and hardworking, earning excellent results in his school examinations. He also enjoyed the familiar interests of young people, including video games and conversations with friends. International politics and history particularly interested him. Those who knew him remembered his warmth and his willingness to make friends across differences of nationality and religion. His biographer, Father George Boronat, described a young man whose concern for others required effort and prayer. Pedro recognized his impatience and worked to become more generous and attentive.

During adolescence, Pedro attended Christian formation activities at Greygarth Hall, an Opus Dei center in Manchester. There, the teaching of Saint Josemaría Escrivá helped him understand that studies, friendships, and daily duties could become occasions for loving God. On May 1, 2013, shortly before his seventeenth birthday, he asked for admission to Opus Dei as a numerary. He began a path of commitment to apostolic celibacy and service while remaining a layman, seeking holiness within the ordinary circumstances of the world.

In September 2014, Pedro began studying chemical engineering at Imperial College London and lived at Netherhall House. He quickly formed friendships among his fellow students. During his first term, however, he experienced back pain. By the end of that year, doctors had diagnosed advanced cancer in his pelvis. His university plans were interrupted, and he returned to Manchester for treatment near his family. The young man preparing for a professional career now faced an illness that would demand much of his remaining strength.

Pedro received treatment at the Christie Hospital in Manchester and traveled to Heidelberg, Germany, for proton beam therapy in 2015. For a time, the results offered hope. He continued trying to pursue his education and eventually began studies at the University of Manchester in 2016. As pain increased, completing assignments became difficult. Sometimes he dictated his work to another resident while lying down. He also used a car provided to assist his mobility to give fellow students lifts, turning a practical necessity into another opportunity for friendship.

His concern for others continued in hospital. He befriended patients and nurses and took an interest in their lives beyond the ward. In November 2015, he met Pope Francis in Rome and presented a card signed by fellow cancer patients. His father recalled that Pedro told the pope he was offering his suffering for him and for the Church. This offering expressed the spiritual meaning Pedro sought within his illness. As treatment continued, he tried to unite his pain with Christ and pray for the good of others.

The struggle was painful and prolonged. Father Joseph Evans, the chaplain of Greygarth Hall, remembered occasions when Pedro cried, became discouraged, or reacted impatiently. Friends and family helped him pray, and priests brought him Communion and offered confession. When pain made sustained prayer difficult, he offered the suffering itself to God. Less than a month before his death, visiting friends recalled that he encouraged each of them to persevere in his vocation. Asked whether he was happy, Pedro answered, “I have never been happier.”

When further treatment could no longer help him, Pedro asked to remain at Greygarth Hall, the place he regarded as home. His parents, brothers, friends, and fellow members of Opus Dei accompanied him. He died there in the early hours of January 13, 2018, aged twenty one, while those beside him prayed the Salve Regina. His funeral brought together hundreds of people. That July, the University of Manchester awarded him a posthumous master’s degree in chemical engineering, which his brother Carlos received on his behalf.

On May 13, 2026, the Diocese of Salford announced the opening of Pedro’s cause for beatification and canonization. The Church began gathering testimony and writings to examine his life, virtues, and reputation for holiness. He is known as a Servant of God, and his cause remains a process of discernment. His story has drawn attention through the ordinary ways he sought to love Christ, including diligent study, loyal friendship, prayer, and concern for others during illness. Those who knew him remembered a young man who kept trying to give himself to God through the life before him.

For a devotional image of Servant of God Pedro Ballester, click here: Maryvale Catholic Press

Venerable Rafael Cordero, The Teacher Who Opened Doors

Venerable Rafael Cordero

Rafael Cordero y Molina was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on October 24, 1790, into a free Black family. His parents, Lucas Cordero and Rita Molina, taught him to read and write at home. Poverty and racial prejudice restricted opportunities for children like Rafael, but his education began with what his family could give him. Those lessons became the foundation of a lifetime spent helping other children learn.

Teaching was already part of his family’s life. His parents offered instruction to other children, sharing their knowledge without payment. In 1810, when Rafael was twenty, he began a free school of his own. His sister Celestina also became a teacher, educating girls. Through their work, the siblings helped children whose families could not easily obtain an education. Rafael’s school would become a lasting part of life in San Juan.

Rafael earned his living by making and selling cigars. That work helped support both his household and his teaching. He charged his pupils no tuition and used his own money to provide supplies for children who needed them. His lessons included reading, writing, arithmetic, penmanship, and Christian doctrine. Learning required books, materials, and patient instruction, and Rafael supplied these through years of steady work. His livelihood and his service to children grew together.

In his school on Luna Street, boys from different backgrounds learned together. Black children and white children attended, as did sons of poor families and sons of prosperous households. Rafael’s reputation brought pupils whose parents could have chosen other teachers. Among those he educated were Alejandro Tapia y Rivera, José Julián Acosta, and Román Baldorioty de Castro, who later became important figures in Puerto Rican literature and public life. Some of his pupils became prominent opponents of slavery.

For Rafael, education included the formation of conscience. He was a committed Catholic layman who taught Christian doctrine and placed prayer at the center of his work. His classroom gave him a place to serve God through the daily responsibilities of teaching. Alongside the skills his pupils needed for work and further study, he sought to give them a moral foundation. His religious faith shaped the purpose of the school and the care he offered its children.

His generosity extended beyond lessons. When the Sociedad Económica de Amigos del País awarded him one hundred pesos in recognition of his virtue, he divided the money. Half provided books and clothing for needy pupils, and half went to other poor people. Accounts of his life also describe him sharing his food with people who came hungry to his door. The teacher who offered education freely also responded to immediate needs with the resources he had.

For fifty eight years, Rafael continued teaching. In 1865, the government formally recognized his work and granted him a small monthly salary. The recognition came late in a career already sustained by decades of personal effort. Even as his life approached its end, he remained concerned about his pupils. According to the priest who later promoted his cause for canonization, Rafael asked the authorities to ensure that his last students could complete their education.

Rafael died in San Juan on July 5, 1868, at seventy seven. A remembered appeal from his final days asked his pupils to pray for him. The man who had spent so much of his life helping children now asked for their prayers. He left behind generations of students and a school whose influence reached far beyond its classroom. Puerto Rico continued to remember him as Maestro Rafael, honoring the vocation he had practiced for most of his life.

On December 9, 2013, Pope Francis authorized the decree recognizing Rafael Cordero’s heroic virtues, giving him the title Venerable. His life offers an example of holiness lived through an ordinary occupation and sustained service. Making cigars, providing school supplies, teaching children, and sharing food became the daily work of his charity. Across nearly six decades, Maestro Rafael made education available to boys of different races and incomes, giving his Catholic faith a lasting expression in the lives he helped form.

For a devotional image of Venerable Rafael, click here: Maryvale Catholic Press

Saint Pedro Calungsod, A Young Catechist Faithful to the End

 

Saint Pedro Calungsod

Pedro Calungsod was born around 1654 in the Visayas region of the Philippines. Few details of his early life have survived, but his service to the Church is remembered clearly. As a young man, he received formation from Jesuit missionaries and became a lay catechist. His love for Christ led him to teach the faith and assist the priests in their missionary work.

In 1668, while still a teenager, Pedro accompanied Father Diego Luis de San Vitores and other missionaries to the Mariana Islands. Leaving family and friends behind, he undertook the demanding work of evangelizing the Chamorro people. His faith was sustained by devotion to the Eucharist and the Blessed Virgin Mary. He brought to the mission the generosity of a young person willing to place his life at the service of the Gospel.

Life on the islands was difficult. Supplies arrived irregularly, dense vegetation made travel arduous, and typhoons threatened the communities. The missionaries persevered, and many people received baptism. Yet distrust also grew. Missionary accounts describe a rumor that baptismal water was poisonous. Some children who had been baptized during serious illnesses subsequently died, and their deaths helped the accusation spread. Hostility toward the mission became increasingly dangerous.

On April 2, 1672, Pedro and Father Diego arrived at Tomhom, now known as Tumon, on Guam. A man named Matapang, who had previously accepted Christianity, angrily refused baptism for his infant daughter. While he went to enlist another villager, Hirao, against the missionaries, the child’s Christian mother consented to her baptism. Father Diego baptized the girl. When Matapang learned what had happened, his anger intensified.

The two men attacked. Pedro initially avoided the spears thrown at him. According to the testimony preserved in the accounts of his martyrdom, he could have escaped, but he chose to remain beside Father Diego. The missionaries’ young companion stayed with the priest whose work he had shared for four years. His fidelity continued even when remaining meant facing death.

A spear struck Pedro in the chest, and Hirao killed him with a blow to the head. Father Diego gave him sacramental absolution before the priest was himself killed. Their attackers weighted the bodies with stones and cast them into the sea. Neither body was recovered. Pedro’s brief life ended far from his homeland, beside the missionary he had refused to abandon.

The Church remembers Pedro as a lay catechist and martyr. At his beatification, Pope John Paul II invited young people to draw courage from his example. His witness included the years of teaching and service that preceded his final sacrifice. While still in his teens, he had answered Christ’s call through missionary work, perseverance, and loyalty in the face of danger.

Pope John Paul II beatified Pedro on March 5, 2000, and Pope Benedict XVI canonized him on October 21, 2012. His feast is April 2. His story continues to encourage young Catholics and catechists to serve Christ generously and to remain faithful when that service becomes difficult.

For a devotional image of St. Pedro, click here: Maryvale Catholic Press