Salvador Damián Enguix Garés was born on 29 September 1862 in Alieria into a devout Catholic family. He grew up in the steady practice of the faith and, as an adult, married and became the father of six children. By profession he was a professor of veterinary medicine; by vocation he was an active lay apostle who took part in the work of Catholic Action and lived his baptismal call in the ordinary duties of family, work, and parish life.
When the anti-Catholic persecution that accompanied the Spanish Civil War broke upon the Church in Spain, he was singled out because of his open profession of the Catholic religion. He was first arrested on 6 August 1936. Soon afterward he was imprisoned and, remaining steadfast in the faith, was murdered for hatred of the faith. Tradition places his death in late October 1936; the Church keeps his memory on 28 October.
He is numbered among the many lay faithful and clergy who preferred death to apostasy rather than renounce Christ. On 11 March 2001 Pope John Paul II beatified him as a martyr, together with Blessed José Aparicio Sanz and 232 companions, recognizing that he shed his blood in odium fidei.
May Blessed Salvador Damián Enguix Garés obtain for us the grace of courageous fidelity, and let us imitate today his steadfast witness as a husband, father, and lay apostle who loved Christ unto death.
