SAINT ANTONY MARY CLARET
Claretian Archbishop and Founder
(1807-1870)
St. Antony Claret was ordained in 1835. In 1849, he founded a missionary institute of priests. He was appointed bishop of Santiago in Cuba in 1850 and spent six years of arduous pastoral work there.
While in Cuba, St. Antony preached liberation and the kingdom of God, which scandalized some slave owners, who made attempts on his life.
In 1857, St. Antony was appointed confessor to Queen Isabella of Spain. In 1868, revolution caused him to go into exile in France, where he died in 1870.