St. Miguel de la Mora de la Mora

St. Miguel de la Mora prayed the rosary as he was shot within sight of his brother.

Knights of Columbus Council 2140

Zacatecas, Mexico

Miguel de la  Mora de la Mora was born in the municipality of Tecaltlán, Jalisco, on June 19, 1874. During his infancy he learned about cattle raising and agricultural work and came to be a good horseman. As an adolescent, he enrolled in the conciliar seminary of Colima, where he did his ecclesiastical studies until he was ordained a priest in 1906.

He was the minister at the Cathedral in Tomatlán, the hacienda of San Antonio in Zapotitlán, and, finally, again at the Cathedral, where he was the chaplain of the choir.

When the suspension of public religious services was declared, he chose to remain at his family’s home. “What would happen to Colima without priests?” he said. There, he celebrated the Mass with extreme caution. Despite his care, the chief of military operations in Colima, General José Ignacio Flores, who lived in the house in front of his, identified him as a clergyman and ordered his arrest. He was released on bail, with an emphatic order to resume services at the Cathedral against the church’s orders.

He left Colima to seek refuge in his home town. On the night of Aug. 7, 1927, dressed as a peasant and accompanied by his brother Regino and the clergyman Crispiniano Sandoval, Father de la Mora left for the mountains. At an inn in Cardona, Colima, someone recognized him: “You’re the priest,” he said. “Yes, I am,” Father de la Mora replied.

That remark was enough for a government supporter to apprehend and tie up the three men, taking them on foot to the Colima military operations headquarters.

On the way, Crispiniano Sandoval, who had not been identified as a clergyman, escaped. In Colima, when General Flores found out about the escape, he ordered the immediate execution of the de la Mora brothers in the barracks stables on top of horse manure.

While he was saying the rosary, Father de la Mora was shot by the executioners before the astonished eyes of his brother Regino, who was spared and freed.

Father de la Mora was buried in the municipal cemetery. Two years later his remains were placed in the cathedral.

Based on Canonización de Veintisiete Santos Mexicanos