GIL VALLS, ENCARNACIÓN, BL.

Lay martyr, teacher; b. Jan. 27, 1888, Onteniente (Ontinyent), Valencia, Spain; d. Sept. 24, 1936, L'Ollería, Valencia. Gaspar Gil and Adriana Valls had their daughter María Encarnación baptized at St. Mary's Church, Onteniente, the day following her birth. From them she and her siblings learned how to live and die as Christians. She was confirmed May 24, 1893 and received her First Communion in 1899.

Encarnación received private instruction until she studied in Valencia to become a teacher. Thereafter she was tutor in the household of Pasquala Enríquez de Navarra y Mayans de Calatayud de Valencia and a teacher at Albuixech (Valencia; 1915–22). She was beloved by her students. On the hour she would orally pray an Ave Maria, followed by some pious ejaculation. As the children did their work each afternoon, she prayed the Rosary. On Saturdays she reminded her charges of their obligation to attend Sunday Mass. She often allowed some of her students to accompany her on Saturdays when she visited her brother Gaspar at the seminary in Valencia where he was studying.

In 1922, the ownership of the school changed hands and Encarnación went to live with her brother Gaspar and assist him in his parish work. With him she founded the Patronato de la Infancia (Foundation of Infancy) and taught catechism to children. Personally she was distinguished by her simplicity, self–sacrifice, apostolic fervor, and charity, especially towards children.

She was known to rise early to spend time in meditation and to attend Mass daily. Encarnación belonged to the Nocturnal Adoration Society, Third Order of Carmelites, Daughters of Mary, and other Catholic groups. She was also secretary of Catholic Action. She exercised her social apostolate as a teacher of woman workers.

Shortly after the Spanish Revolution began, her brother Gaspar was imprisoned and their home confiscated. Undaunted, Encarnación said that they had offered their lives to God for the salvation of Spain; all she asked was that she die with her brother. On September 24, the militia came to her door telling her to accompany her imprisoned brother to Porta Coeli Hospital. She asked that a friend, Juan Recatalá Fuertes, also accompany them. They were taken instead to the marble quarry near the port of Ollería, where the brother and sister were summarily executed and buried in the cemetery of Canals. Their bodies were transferred to the cemetery of Onteniente after the war and later translated to San Carlos Church. She was beatified by Pope John Paul II with José Aparicio Sanz and 232 companions on March 11, 2001.

Feast: Sept. 22.

Bibliography: v. cÁrcel ortÍ, Martires españoles del siglo XX (Madrid 1995). w. h. carroll, The Last Crusade (Front Royal, VA 1996). j. pÉrez de urbel, Catholic Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War, tr. m. f. ingrams (Kansas City, MO 1993). r. royal, The Catholic Martyrs of the Twentieth Century (New York 2000). L'Osservatore Romano, Eng. Ed. no. 11 (Mar. 14, 2001), 1–4, 12.

[k. i. rabenstein]