Enrique Angelelli

On July 3, 1968, Pope Paul VI appointed him Bishop of the Diocese of La Rioja, a poor and arid province in northwestern Argentina. He was solemnly installed there on August 24, 1968. In his new diocese, Bishop Angelelli strove to fervently apply the social and pastoral guidelines of the Second Vatican Council and the Medellín Conference. He placed human promotion and social justice at the heart of his action. He encouraged the creation of agricultural cooperatives to enable small farmers to live with dignity from their work, and actively supported the unionization of agricultural workers, miners, and domestic employees. His Sunday homilies, broadcast by the local radio, became a voice of hope for the oppressed. This preferential option for the poor drew the fierce hostility of the local oligarchy, large landowners, and conservative fringes of society. In June 1973, during the patronal feast in Anillaco, a hostile crowd organized by wealthy landowners targeted him and threw stones at him, forcing him to interrupt the celebration. After the military coup of March 24, 1976, which established a bloody dictatorship in Argentina, the persecution against the Church of La Rioja intensified dramatically. The bishop's radio broadcasts were banned, and his collaborators were closely monitored and threatened.

The repression against the diocese culminated during the summer of 1976 with the systematic elimination of the bishop's close associates: on July 18, 1976, the French priest Gabriel Longueville and the Franciscan priest Carlos de Dios Murias were kidnapped, tortured, and murdered in Chamical. On July 25, 1976, the layman Wenceslao Pedernera was murdered at his home in Sañogasta before the eyes of his loved ones. Aware that he himself was being directly targeted, but refusing to abandon his flock, Bishop Angelelli gathered evidence and testimonies regarding these murders in a briefcase to transmit them to ecclesiastical and judicial authorities. On August 4, 1976, after celebrating a memorial mass in Chamical for the murdered priests, he set out on the return journey to the provincial capital in a Fiat Multicarga pickup truck, accompanied by Father Arturo Pinto. Near Punta de los Llanos, on National Route 38, their vehicle was chased, closely crowded, and destabilized by another car. The pickup truck rolled over several times. Bishop Angelelli died instantly, suffering a fatal fracture at the base of his skull. The military regime immediately disguised this murder as a simple "road accident." For nearly forty years, the dictatorship and then networks of impunity maintained the accident theory. It was only after the reopening of the judicial investigation in 2010 that the truth emerged. On July 4, 2014, the Federal Court of La Rioja delivered a historic verdict, classifying the bishop's death as a premeditated homicide committed within the framework of state terrorism. Two former high-ranking military officials, General Luciano Benjamín Menéndez and Vice-Commodore Luis Fernando Estrella, were sentenced to life imprisonment for this assassination.

The cause for the beatification of Bishop Angelelli opened at the diocesan level on October 13, 2015, in La Rioja. It was quickly joined to that of his three fellow martyrs (Gabriel Longueville, Carlos de Dios Murias, and Wenceslao Pedernera). On June 8, 2018, Pope Francis signed the decree recognizing their martyrdom in odium fidei (in hatred of the faith), thus paving the way for their beatification. The beatification ceremony was celebrated on April 27, 2019, at the Municipal Park (Parque de la Ciudad) of La Rioja, Argentina. It was presided over by Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints and papal delegate, in the presence of a vast crowd. The four men were proclaimed blessed under the collective name of the "Martyrs of La Rioja." Their liturgical memorial is set for July 17, the anniversary of Bishop Angelelli's birth and the eve of the martyrdom of Fathers Longueville and Murias.

Nicknamed by many the "Argentine Romero," Bishop Enrique Angelelli left an indelible mark on the history of the Church in Latin America. His spirituality was deeply Christocentric, nourished by the Word of God and embodied in the social reality of his people. His episcopal motto, "Para que todos sean uno" (That they may all be one), taken from Christ's priestly prayer in the Gospel of John, guided his pastoral action aimed at gathering and unifying a society deeply divided by injustices. He is particularly famous for his pastoral formula, which has become a principle of life for many believers: "Always have one ear turned to the people, and the other to the Gospel" ("Con un oído en el pueblo y otro en el Evangelio"). This phrase summarizes his vision of a synodal and missionary Church, attentive to the cries of the poor while remaining rigorously faithful to the Revelation. His witness and commitment to a "Church of the poor" deeply influenced the Argentine clergy, notably the young Jorge Mario Bergoglio (the future Pope Francis), who knew him personally and actively supported the recognition of his martyrdom. Today, the site of his martyrdom at Punta de los Llanos has become a national sanctuary and a major place of pilgrimage.