>> Thanks to Catholicism ♥

As he left the cathedral in Quito, Moreno was brutally attacked by a group of assassins. Armed with machetes, the group sliced through the president’s neck, skull and brain, and severed his left arm and right hand.

He stayed on his feet. The man was the Black Knight from Monty Python.

Undeterred, his attackers shot him six times in the chest. He was slashed a total of fourteen times before he finally fell to the ground. Even then he was alive enough to shout, “God does not die!”

After the assassins fled, the cathedral priests took Moreno back inside the church, where he lived for fifteen more minutes.

–7 Historical Figures Who Were Absurdly Hard to Kill

Gabriel Gregorio Fernando José María García y Moreno y Morán de Buitrón (December 24, 1821 – August 6, 1875) was an Ecuadorian politician who twice served as President of Ecuador (1859-1865 and 1869-1875) and was assassinated during his second term, after being elected to a third term. He is noted for his conservatism, Catholic religious perspective and rivalry with liberal strongman Eloy Alfaro. Under his administration, Ecuador became a leader in science and higher education within Latin America. In addition to the advances in education and science, he was noted for economically and agriculturally advancing the country, as well as for his staunch opposition to corruption, even giving his own salary to charity.

Personally pious (he attended Mass, daily, as well as visiting the Blessed Sacrament; he received Holy Communion every Sunday—a rare practice before Pope Pius X—and was active in a sodality), he made it one of the first duties of his government to promote and support Catholicism. Catholicism was the official religion of Ecuador, but by the terms of a new Concordat, the State’s power over appointment of bishops inherited from Spain was eliminated at García Moreno’s insistence. The 1869 constitution made Catholicism the religion of the State and required that both candidates and voters be Catholic. He was the only ruler in the world to protest the Pope’s loss of the Papal States, and two years later had the legislature consecrate Ecuador to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. One of his biographers writes that after this public consecration, he was marked for death by German Freemasons.

García Moreno generated some animosity with his friendship toward the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). During a period of exile, he helped some displaced Jesuits find refuge in Ecuador. He had also advocated legislation which would outlaw secret societies.

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Along with a variety of notable public works programs, García Moreno reformed the universities, established two polytechnic and agricultural colleges and a military school, and increased the number of primary schools from 200 to 500. The number of primary students grew from 8000 to 32,000. To staff the enormously expanded health-care and educational facilities, foreign religious were brought in. All of this was done while expanding the franchise and guaranteeing equal rights under the law to every Ecuadorean.

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The Liberals hated García Moreno; when he was elected a third time in 1875, it was considered to be his death warrant. He wrote immediately to Pope Pius IX asking for his blessing before inauguration day on August 30:

I wish to obtain your blessing before that day, so that I may have the strength and light which I need so much in order to be unto the end a faithful son of our Redeemer, and a loyal and obedient servant of His Infallible Vicar. Now that the Masonic Lodges of the neighboring countries, instigated by Germany, are vomiting against me all sorts of atrocious insults and horrible calumnies, now that the Lodges are secretly arranging for my assassination, I have more need than ever of the divine protection so that I may live and die in defense of our holy religion and the beloved republic which I am called once more to rule.

García Moreno’s prediction was correct; he was assassinated exiting the Cathedral in Quito, struck down with knives and revolvers, his last words being: “¡Dios no muere!” (“God does not die!”). Faustino Rayo assaulted him with six or seven blows of a machete, while three others fired their revolvers.

On August 5, shortly before his assassination, a priest visited García Moreno and warned him, “You have been warned that your death was decreed by the Freemasons; but you have not been told when. I have just heard that the assassins are going to try and carry out their plot at once. For God’s sake, take your measures accordingly!” García Moreno replied that he had already received similar warnings and after calm reflection concluded that the only measure he could take was to prepare himself to appear before God.

“It appears he was assassinated by members of a secret society,” observed a contemporary review of public events.

Gabriel Garcia Moreno received Last Rites just before he died. Pope Pius IX declared that Gabriel Garcia Moreno “died a victim for the Faith and Christian Charity for his beloved country.”

–Gabriel García Moreno

[Civitas Dei]

Manly Catholic of intransigent principles, slain by the enemies of the Faith because of his consistency and courage in defense of the Church and Papacy.
–The heroic and devout president of Ecuador (1) (2)

On January 16, 1599, Our Lady of Good Success appeared to a Conceptionist sister, Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres, in Quito, Ecuador over 250 years before his time to predict his coming, using these words:

“In the 19th Century, there will be a truly Catholic President, a man of character whom God, Our Lord, will give the palm of martyrdom on the square adjoining this convent. He will consecrate this Republic to the Sacred Heart of my Most Holy Son, and this consecration will sustain the Catholic Religion in the years that will follow, which will be ill-fated ones for the Church.”

–Our Lady of Good Success