Pedro de San José Betancur was born on March 21, 1626, in Vilaflor di Tenerife. Son of deeply Christian shepherds and peasants, he decided in 1649 to leave Tenerife. Two years later, he came to Guatemala for his missionary apostolate.
He was immediately struck by a serious illness, which brought him into direct contact with the poorest and most disadvantaged. Recovered, he decided to dedicate himself totally to God, but not being able to afford his studies, he professed as a Franciscan Tertiary in the convent of San Francesco, in present-day Antigua Guatemala. He had a well-defined program: to relive the experience of Jesus of Nazareth in humility, poverty, penance, and service to the poor.
And so, he did: in his time as a guardian and sacristan at the Hermitage of Holy Calvary, near the Franciscan convent, he visited hospitals, prisons, poor people’s homes, unemployed migrants, adolescents without education and in difficulty, for whom he managed to create a first foundation to welcome them. He also built an oratory, a school, an inn for passing priests in the city and for university students who needed safe and affordable housing. Remembering the poverty of Jesus’ first inn on earth, he called his work “Betlemme”.
Other tertiaries imitated him, sharing with Pedro penance, prayer, and charitable activity. Community life took shape when he wrote a rule, which was also adopted by women in charge of raising their children. What would later become the “Order of Men and Women of Bethlehem” was being born, which later obtained recognition by the Holy See.
“Brother Pedro”, as he was called and as he is remembered today, died in Guatemala on April 25, 1667. Saint John Paul II beatified him on June 22, 1980, and canonized him on July 30, 2002, on the occasion of his apostolic visit to Guatemala. In his homily, the Holy Father said: “Brother Pedro, the man who was charity, was a man of deep prayer, both in his homeland and in all stages of his life, until he arrived here, where he assiduously sought the will of God at all times. For this reason he is a striking example for today’s Christians, reminding them that, to be saints, it is necessary to have a Christianity that is distinguished above all in the art of prayer”.
In 19891 in Guatemala, the Friars Minor founded the “Obras Sociales del Santo Hermano Pedro” (Social Works of Saint Brother Pedro), an apolitical, non-governmental, non-profit association, guided by the values of apostolicity, fraternity, and minority, which provides medical, educational, spiritual, moral and social assistance to all low-income, orphaned or abandoned people.
Source: www.causesanti.va.