“Tomorrow we will have one fewer priest.” With these words, disarming in their cynicism, the partisans who killed the young seminarian Rolando Rivi in 1945 commented on the barbarity they had just committed. He was only 14 years old, but his short life was marked by faith, courage, and simplicity.
The martyrdom
Rolando Rivi was a seminarian, at the beginning of a journey that should have led him to fulfill his dream: becoming a priest and missionary. However, his still-unfledged wings were brutally broken in a forest located in the middle of the so-called Triangle of Death, an area of Emilia soaked in blood during the Second World War because of the brutality of the communist partisans.
On April 10, 1945, a partisan patrol abducted Rivi and forced him to follow them into the woods near San Valentino, the hamlet of Castellarano where the young boy lived. His parents were left a note that read: “Don't look for him. He's coming with us partisans for a moment.” Only four days later, his father Roberto Rivi and Father Alberto Camellini, parish priest of San Valentino, found Rolando's body in harrowing condition: his face covered in bruises, his torso battered, and two bullet holes indicating the fatal wounds, one in his left temple and the other at heart level.
The courage of faith
His courageous devotion to the Lord proved fatal. Despite warnings from his loved ones, Rolando would reply: “I cannot, I must not take off my cassock. I am not afraid; I am proud to wear it. I cannot hide. I belong to the Lord.” His cassock was taken from him and displayed as a war trophy by a squad of ruthless executioners of an atheistic and bloodthirsty ideology.
The beatification
Rolando Rivi’s reputation for holiness first spread in the areas where he was killed and then beyond Italy’s borders. In 1989, the first request to open his cause for beatification was submitted. In 2001, news circulated of a miracle attributed to the intercession of Rolando Rivi: an English boy named James inexplicably recovered from a severe form of leukemia after his parents placed a relic of Rolando Rivi under his pillow.
Doctors certified the incredible disappearance of all signs of leukemia from young James on April 4, 2001. In 2006, the Church recognized a series of miraculous healings attributed to Rivi and opened his cause for beatification.
On March 27, 2024, Pope Francis recognized the murder of Rolando Rivi as martyrdom, that is, as a crime committed “out of hatred for the faith”. The solemn celebration of his beatification was held on October 5, 2013, at the Palazzetto dello Sport in Modena.
