St. Peter Claver

St. Peter Claver (1580 - 1654) is an important saint for the Comboni Missionaries ~ and missionaries in general ~ because of the example St. Peter gave us. In the words of John Paul ll, " This saint is one of the greatest, heroic evangelizers that America had during the first phase of the expansion of the Church in the Caribbean". He has gone into the history books with the title Apostle to the African Slaves, because of his pastoral love to protect, assist, aid and evangelize the slaves who were being brought from Africa.  

It was during a pastoral visit by John Paul ll to his tomb in Cartagena, Columbia that he continued, "I lift my prayer together with that of the Apostle of the Black Slaves, in defence of victims of all kinds of modern slavery, that oppress many men and women today. May St. Peter Claver obtain abundant spiritual and material benefits for all the Afro-Americans spread across the various regions of the Americas, so that they may achieve, according to God's design, their full human development, both personal and social."

St. Daniel Comboni chose St. Peter Claver as patron for his Institutes of Sisters and Priests/Brothers ~ and he has rightly been confirmed as such for us today, a model for the rebirth of the poorest and most abandoned.