Venerable Anna Kolesárová

Anna Kolesárová (14 July 1928 – 22 November 1944) was a Slovak Roman Catholic virgin and a martyr. Her life was cut short in 1944 when a Soviet soldier killed her after she resisted his rape attempt. Those who knew her best described her as being a modest and simple girl who attended Mass each morning and assumed care of the household following her mother's death in her late childhood. Kolesárová's beatification process opened in 2004 and she became titled as a Servant of God upon the cause's launch. The process culminated on 6 March 2018 after Pope Francis confirmed both that she had died in defensum castitatis ("in defense of chastity") and her forthcoming beatification. The beatification was celebrated on 1 September 2018 in Slovakia. Anna Kolesárová was born on 14 July 1928 in the Michalovce District in the former Czechoslovakia to Ján Kolesár (known to friends as "Hruška") and Anka née Kušnírová. Anna was the youngest of three, she had a half sister, Mary, and a brother Michal. Her baptism was celebrated in their local parish on 15 July. The Kolesárs were described as a pious farmers that were frequent Mass attendees who lived out their faith in concrete manners. Her mother died sometime after she turned ten and it fell upon her to assume care of the household and for her older brother Michal. Those around her described her life as being both modest and simple while also noting her frequent presence at church. Kolesárová attended Mass with her friends after she completed the household chores. In 1944 - in the autumn - the final and bloodiest phase to World War II (the Eastern front) was passing through the Kolesárová's native Zemplín region, which was then a part of the Hungarian state. It was during this violent transition period that the people living in surrounding villages would hide in their cellars to wait for the shelling and fighting to end. On 22 November 1944 the Red army soldiers entered the town.