Many Catholics recognize St. Maria Goretti as a 20th-century virgin martyr. The young girl was murdered in 1902, at age 11, by her 20-year old neighbor when she refused his advances and attempt to rape her. She died a day later, after having forgiven her attacker who, after serving 27 years in prison and converted, eventually came to finish his days living in a Capuchin monastery.

When she was canonized in 1950, St. Maria Goretti was something of a novelty. While St. John Paul II and his successors consciously strove to canonize saints of the 20th century in order to emphasize that holiness (and its persecution) are very real realities today, that was not typical in 1950. Centuries separated most saints from those seeking their intercession. Most were priests or religious, not lay girls. Many young women present at that canonization in 1950 had female relatives — a mother or a grandmother — alive when Maria Goretti was. That was all something novel.

But Maria Goretti was hardly the only virgin martyr of the 20th century. Two other girls are honored by the Church in November, but their stories are far less known.

Blessed Karolina Kózka

Blessed Karolina Kózka (KOO-shka) died Nov. 18, 1914, aged 16. Called the “Polish Maria Goretti,” St. John Paul II beatified her in 1987. 

Blessed Karolina was born Aug. 2, 1898, in southern Poland. At the time of her birth, her country had been under Austrian occupation for over a century. Her father and mother were farmers, and she was one of 11 children. She received six years of primary education and then began two years of supplemental schooling. Her father was said to have kept a small lending library of Catholic books and periodicals for people in the neighborhood. She received her First Holy Communion in 1907 and Confirmation in May 1914, approximately six months before she was murdered.

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