Sára Salkaházi was born May 11, 1899 in Kassa (Slovakia). A member of the Sisters of Social Service, a charity organization helping the poor, Sára Salkaházi was a journalist, a writer and a cultural activist. She helped to shelter hundreds of Jews in a convent in 1944. The Sisters of Social Service saved over a thousand lives during the Second World War. Sára Salkaházi was denounced and the ruling Arrow Cross Party discovered the Jews in hiding.
On December 27, 1944, they lined up Sára Salkaházi and the people she sheltered on the banks of the Danube River in Budapest and shot them. A decree recognizing Sára Salkaházi as a martyr was signed by Pope Benedict XVI on April 28, 2006. The beatification ceremony will be held in Saint Stephen’s Basilica on September 17, 2006. Beatification is the first step towards sainthood.
