On October 8-10, 2024, the Province of St. Jerome in Croatia, the Italian Province of St. Anthony of Padua (Northern Italy), and the Province of St. Joseph in Slovenia, jointly organized a pilgrimage following the footsteps of the Servant of God Friar Placido CORTESE, a Conventual Franciscan born in Cres, which is now part of Croatia.
On Tuesday evening, October 8, the pilgrims arrived at the St. Francis Friary in Cres after having visited the city of Trieste, Italy, where Friar Placido spent the last days of his life.
On Wednesday, October 9, the pilgrims visited some important historical and cultural monuments: Friar Placido’s birthplace, the church where he was baptized and confirmed, and the church of the St. Francis Friary, where Friar Placido met the Conventual Franciscans and felt his religious calling. The Most Reverend Ivica PETANJAK, OFM Cap, Bishop of Krk, Croatia, presided over the Mass with many priests from Cres concelebrating and the pilgrims from Italy attending. In his homily, Bishop PETANJAK shed light on Friar Placido’s life journey, highlighting his courage and devotion to God’s call to serve those imprisoned in concentration camps, to whom he provided food, medicine and necessary documents. In the afternoon, the pilgrims visited the Holy Savior Chapel that Placido mentioned in two of his letters.
On Thursday morning, October 10, the Vicar Provincial of the Province of Croatia, Friar Martin JAKOVIĆ, presided over Mass at the St. Francis Friary in Cres, with Friar Ljudevit MARAČIĆ giving the homily. Friar Ljudevit highlighted some historical events that Friar Placido wrote about in his letters, in which he mentioned the friary and church in Cres. At the end of the Mass, the faithful stood before an image of the Servant of God Friar Placido to pray for their intentions and to implore the Lord to raise Friar Placido to the honor of the altars.
Friar Placido CORTESE was born in Cres on March 7, 1907. He died in Trieste on November 3, 1944. He spent much of his life in Italy, particularly at the Basilica of Sant’Antonio in Padua. He could soon be declared a blessed, as a Martyr of Nazism, as was St. Maximilian Kolbe and many other priests and religious. For this reason and other similarities with St. Maximilian, he is often called the “Kolbe of Cres.” In addition to his regular priestly duties, Friar Placido directed the monthly Messaggero di Sant’Antonio magazine for seven years, increasing its circulation from 300,000 to 800,000 copies per month, despite World War II. Like Kolbe, he also founded a Provincial printing house to facilitate and expand publishing. He wrote numerous articles, letters and homilies, and often took photographs.
He always remained attached to his homeland, to his sister and to the rest of his family and relatives in Cres. Kind-hearted, humble, and sensitive to others’ needs, Friar Placido quickly became an ideal person to assist refugees, exiles, internees, and prisoners from the Veneto Region of Italy. Working with a network of collaborators, he provided assistance to people from Croatia, Slovenia, Czechoslovakia, Slovakia, exiled Jews, captured allied pilots, and others needing help to escape Nazi persecution.
On October 13, 1944, two friends and collaborators betrayed Friar Placido to the Nazis. From that moment on, all record of him was lost. After several decades of research, it was finally discovered that he had been taken to the Gestapo headquarters in Trieste. There, he underwent interrogation and cruel torture to force him to reveal his accomplices. According to eyewitnesses in Trieste, his torturers gouged out his eyes and cut out his tongue before killing him under torture in early November. He was thirty-seven. His body was likely incinerated at a nearby crematorium.
His love for his neighbor until death, death he neither feared nor ran away from while he continued to help others, distinguishes him as a man, priest, and friar who may soon be recognized as a blessed and ultimately canonized as a saint.
Friar Zlatko VLAHEK, Provincial Secretary
